Da Daum Brew Blog

moved to tumblr

2011-02-28T13:43:00.000-05:00

I've moved on and over to tumblr...follow link

http://kevindaum.tumblr.com/

Geared up or geek'd up?

2010-01-16T07:31:00.000-05:00

An article in this year's VeloNews Buyer's Guide outlined the time savings by implementing various aerodynamic equipment options. The results were based on a 40k TT being covered in 48min (about 50km/hr or 31+mph). While the time savings would be greater the longer it takes you to cover the 40k, the time savings would not be linear since effort to increase speed rises exponentially. In other words, if it took you twice as long to cover the 40k, you would not necessarily realize double the time savings since you would be more than halving the amount of wind resistance you create to go 15.5mph versus 31mph. Hope this makes sense.

In any case, the results are quite surprising.....

> Shoe Covers ($30) save 30sec over regular shoes
> Skin suit ($250) saves 134sec over standard bibs/jersey
> Aero helmet ($165) saves 67sec over regular bike helmet
> Aero front wheel (up to $1000) saves 42sec over spoked training wheel
> Aero rear wheel (up to $1500) saves 29sec over spoked training wheel
> Aero bike (up to $12,000) saves 17sec over round tube TT bike

New Urban Transportation

2010-01-15T13:57:00.000-05:00

Martin Angelov shared his funky concept for a new urban way of transportation dubbed “Kolelinia” with us . Kolelinia proposes that we ride our bicycles on a steel wire as a new type of bicycle lane. The idea was awarded first for the international “Line of Site” competition.

More about Kolelinia after the break.

“The first crazy idea which came to my mind was to make flying bicycle-lanes, using steel wire, something like ski lift but working on the opposite principle in which the wire is static and it doesn’t need electricity,” explained Angelov, who presented a more developed version of Kolelinia on Sofia’s TEDX conference a few days ago.

Working off the idea that transportation has to “not only be a transport, it has to be an experience,” Angelov has turned an initial idea into a developed possibility (especially with the addition of his safety features). Angelov’s ideas make us question whether it is possible to achieve a completely new level of transportation with minimum resources.

All images courtesy of Angelov.

Article taken from ArchDaily - http://www.archdaily.com
URL to article: http://www.archdaily.com/46236/kolelinia-martin-angelov/

It's official!

2010-01-11T09:21:00.000-05:00

It's tough to find time for our winter pursuits, I think Connie got out to snowboard once last year while I headed out to Colorado. With that said, its been about 2 years since Connie decided to try snowsports and focused on snowboarding. She's been a gym rat playing bball, softball and volleyball all her life. She still holds a Ohio High School record in softball for stolen bases and went on to play in college. She had never skied or snowboard in her life. The first time I took her out I had my doubts she would continue, why you ask...black and blue knees, bruised tailbone, unable to walk the next day, and plenty of spousal abuse coming my way...such a potty mouth she has! She stuck with it and we went out a few more times and she started to pick it up. Last year we went down to Snowshoe chasing the first storm of the year, it was great...or so I thought. Connie ended up getting cut off and fell down a 3 foot embankment and was upside down in the trees! She survived but she was scarred and did not go out much more that weekend...or all for the rest of the year. Well...Look at her now...it all came together for her this weekend in NY. Perfect conditions, empty wide open slopes and a bucket of confidence. Why I mentioned the rough times, because she stuck it out and I'm must say... I'm damn proud!

Turn up the volume..

This is racing

2009-12-28T10:08:00.000-05:00

Sunday morning at the Vulture's Knob

2009-12-27T16:33:00.000-05:00

Started GPS'n the courses for the new website this morning. Met up with Mr. Groovy for a bit, always good conversations with Rody. First up...map out the prologue course, then the cross course, then went out and mapped the "mellow yellow" course with all the bypasses. Ground was frozen and riding was great. Finally went out and mapped the "red is rad" course with all the so called advanced obstacles. By that time the course was beginning to thaw in spots...made for tougher riding via soft trails on sore legs from hard training week but gave me a good chance to put the belt drive through its paces...worked flawless and cut right though the mud...no chain suck...not much more to say, will be nice to try out in a race some time next year.

Changed clothes and went over to the quarry where I meet up with my Dad, his brother, my brother Craig and my sisters boyfriend to shoot off 1000 rounds. We had a couple hand guns and 22's. It was a good time.

Leadville Trail 100 mountain bike race

2009-12-23T13:17:00.005-05:00

Dear Kevin Daum,
Thank you from the Leadville Trail 100! sucka!

Entry is in for 2010. Motivation is sub 8:30 time split & beat my personal best of 8:48 set in 2005. (Lance beat it by 2 flipp'n hours) Bring it on...

Here's the game plan as I have unfiinished business. I could not locate prior results on the new LT100 website so this is all I could gather from my notes. This is my motivation.

time splits

Sub 8 goals/splits
2:00
2:48
4:16
4:51
5:38
7:57:22

Sub 8:30 goals/splits
2:00
2:46
4:25
4:55
5:50
8:29:25

2007 Actual Times
1.54
2:36
4:29
5:05
6:05
8:50:30

2005 Actual Times
1:58
2:42
4:39
5:12
6:08
8:48:56

2004 Actual Time
2:02
?
4:50
5:32
6:41
9:45:33

Placings

2007 Actual
?
?
?
?
?
?

2005 Actual
33rd
34th
53rd
59th
56th
58th

2004 Actual
?
?
?
?
?
111th

New website for 331

2009-12-20T12:35:00.002-05:00

The race promotion game never ends. Been working with sponsors ever since the season ended. Last two weeks been trying to get the new race website polished and off the ground.| www.331racing.com/entry.html | Been waking up at 5:00am, coffee & food...then on the trainer for 1-2 hours of good focused interval training, been focusing on increasing the wattage and everything seems to be going according to plan. Last time I seriously trained was 2 years ago, as of this winter my baseline wattage numbers are up. don't know how..must have been the deep seated rest...what else could it have been. Back to the website...check it out...the hidden entry can be found here www.331racing.com/entry.html. I owe a huge thanks to guys at www.gamesnake.com for helping me pull this together as the backbone of the site will enable countless opportunities moving forward. Its not released the masses yet, so let me know if you stumble across any errors or typos and let me know what you think. Check out the new logo for the Findley time trial. Still working on pulling together the details on the westbranch enduro. On a side note...time flies... not sure i can pull off the urban assault mtbr race in downtown Akron due to to much happening this year, I need help to pull it together so if anyone is interested in helping heading this up let me know.

Vultures Knob phase 2 - update 3

2009-11-29T21:19:00.005-05:00

Arch Bridge is coming along, taking a ton of time to drill and bolt the railings, the hold back is not having a generator (yet), our battery supply is only lasting a couple of hours each day. The last item is to trim the posts and then plywood the sides... and then waterproof the whole bridge... I'm guessing we'll have to wait til summer to waterproof, or can we waterproof wet wood, dunno?

We have 4 new cross country trails flagged and ready to go. We'll have a trail day next Sunday December 6th to knock them out. Lets meet at the quarry area at 9:00am if your itching to build.

video of a very primitive rough cut DH line was shot today by Jake...can be seen here... http://vimeo.com/7886563

Vulture's Knob phase 2 - slopestyle beginnings

2009-11-25T09:06:00.003-05:00

The shaping and sculpting has begun. Give the dirt a little bit of lov'n and spanking and it gives back.
Dustin and I continued on the bridge supports this saturday, bolting in the railings and such. Sunday... Mike, Jay, and Rick met up with others and began laying out the slopestyle course.

video someone shot of the beginnings
http://vimeo.com/7763823

2010 NEO Race date preview

2009-11-19T14:55:00.003-05:00

Been sitting on the 2010 dates for a month or so... dates are looking pretty solid...but waiting to see if there is any overlap with other event organizers before we give the final stamp of approval.

I create this calender to help plan each season and do my best not to overlap dates, especially big Regional events. Disclaimer...This early in the game the dates are definitely subject to change...Disclaimer

Click here for the - Calendar forward to 2010 months - Our dates are pretty solid - The OMBC /NUES dates are purely based on 2009, I'll update this Calender once final schedule gets published.

VKnob series will be 5 races for 2010.

NEO Power Series will be 5 races. #1 - Start at Findley State park with a time trail. #2 - Big Valley Race at Camp Manatoc. #3 - Enduro race at Westbranch (slightly longer then traditional XC race) #4 -Medina for Time Trial number two. #5 - We'll finish off the Power Series at Vulture's Knob with Oktoberfest/Halloween race / bonfire and good times! (still working on downtown Akron urban short track race - stay tuned)

Vultures Knob phase 2 - update

2009-11-15T19:28:00.006-05:00

ictures don't quite give you the scale, but think smooth and think big. Rick cut the backbone of the freeride, downhill course this past week that he and PhatJay have been laying out. Next phase will be refinement with a bobcat, then final tweeking with bikes and hand tools.

The XC course will be seeing some changes, the drop into the bowl (upper powerline) is gone, instead a new rocky section has been located and cut in on the ridge line, it will take a couple days to get it done but the Team Soupcan showed up in force and helped cut the corridor of the new trail which will overlook the new freeride area. A decent size bridge will have to be made, or alot of rocks...we'll figure it out. The speed of the upper bowl will be missed, some will shed tears, other will whine and complain, but give it a chance, this is only year 2 of the Vulture's Knob rehab.

We also flagged out some new XC trail above junkyard hill and another section near ant town. We'll announce some trail days in the near future. If your itching to lend a hand, shoot me an email or reply and I'll let you know when we are down there... until then, enjoy!

"click on photo for more detail"

118 mile ride to Columbus

2009-11-15T18:40:00.004-05:00

Saturday, 65 degrees middle of November...who'd thunk it? Today was good. Cavs won, Buckeyes won, the Medina Soccer team won the state championship and I got in a 118 mile road ride. Instead of wasting 2 hours in the car driving to Columbus Crew Soccer Stadium to the watch the state championship match I decide to see where my fitness stood. I have not ridden much the last 2 years but planning to jump back in next year with another attack at Leadville and various other races. So set off to see how 100 miles would feel this early in the comeback training. Choose a great route, thru seville to route 3 into Wooster then hopped on 95 thru Mohican State Forest / Butler onto Fredericktown (got lost for a few minutes) to Sparta Rd to 65 to Cleveland to Hudson to Crew Stadium... low traffic, (until Columbus) good clean roads and great scenery. The only bummer was the wind which was in my face the entire way, I was shooting for a 20mph pace but ended up with 17avg. not bad considering i could not hear the music through my headphones due to the constant low grade wind and had no pace line to hide behind. Ride took me 7 hours, I arrived to game 20 minutes late, but just in time to enter the stadium and witness the first goal of the match which put us up 1-0 at half. The second half Medina found the net 3 more times to win the State Championship 4-0.

<a href="http://www.trailguru.com/wiki/index.php/Track:A8JH">road to Columbus 118 miles to state finals (Road Biking) | Unknown Rd</a>

Red Flannel Ride

2009-11-12T14:10:00.002-05:00

First long ride in over 2 years, 65 miles or so.

Juan wrote it up on his blog if your interested

http://talesfromthecommute.blogspot.com/2009/11/red-flannel-agony.html

Vulture's Knob phase 2

2009-11-12T11:11:00.000-05:00

Race season over...time to get back at the trail...the transformation continues. This was the house as it stood winter of 2008. Bart from Paradise Mulch began the demo. The house came down and Dustin spent all summer picking wood to use. We used the old siding to side the outhouse. Then race season came and the pile of wreckage sat all summer long...quite the eyesore...but we had plans...sorta.

Fast forward to yesterday. Rick is an old school mtbr from the day when I originally started Mt biking...Rick and Porter had incredible trails out towards Bath, Hinckley area. Rick stopped biking but showed up to the last Vknob race last year and was jazzed about the happenings and wanted to lend a hand. In fact, he was so jazzed he pulled out his old bike John Tomac personally gave him and proceeded to race the Reagan Time trial and he plans on racing more this coming year. He has expert dozer experience and quickly dug a small hole and dropped the house into and covered her up. Then proceeded to clean up the brush around the trees. This will be a nice park like setting for camping, parking, maybe the kids playground that I've been drilled for not having.

The final project...a little grading and some grass seed in the spring and you'll never know a house once stood there.

Finally had some time to work on the podium, carved in the 2 and the 3. Will paint it up in spring when the temps warm up.

built up/cut up a bunch of ladders for the new elevated section of fun...now we build the frames and nail these ladders down....coming soon?

Monday, Jason met with Alber excavation guys along with Rick and the downhill, dual solemn, free ride area started to become a reality. After today the foundation of the run should be in place with berms, jumps and start area.

We are working on a new website...more to come later.

Catching up

2009-11-12T10:33:00.000-05:00

Where to start... 2010 race schedule set, 10 races total. Sponsors are renewing which is great. Vulture's Knob phase 2 has began. Back on the bike, wattage numbers up 30watts compared to last test I did 3 years ago, not bad for not riding much last 2 years as I focused on other projects. Looking to go back to Leadville this year and do a few other endurance races. I'll post a few posts on each item in the next couple of days.

Back in the saddle

2009-06-23T08:39:00.003-05:00

So I finally started riding again, Connie has the summer off and I don't have to take Landon to school in the morning so that gives me the opportunity to ride to work. Its about 23 miles each way, 50 minutes of road and 30 minutes of towpath. Its a great low traffic route down Bath Rd into the path which leads all the way into downtown Akron. 3 decent hills into and outta the valley each way. Been averaging 2 days a week the last 3 weeks due to all the rain and my low fitness level, but uping to 4-5 days this week if my weak body and strong mind can handle it, so that will give me 200 miles in the saddle and will help in regaining my lost fitness. Got over the hump last week and instead of feeling whooped when done now I feel great and energized. The best part about commute is I usually spend 1 hour a day in the car driving, now I can turn that hour into a good workout while the family is sleeping and also get my afterwork training in on the way home, a much better use of time while minimizing time away the family and saving cash on gas! This morning I was cruising in a good tempo zone when I spotted a blue heron, he jumped up and flew right next to me for a good 1/2 mile...it was a cool feeling.

This is the route from an Iphone app I've been messing with.

Akron to Medina commute to work (Road Biking) | Akron, OH 44321, USA

Charity Ride - Marching Miles

2009-04-29T13:22:00.010-05:00

Landon and I had the opportunity to participate in the Marching Miles fund raiser for the local Children's Hospital's hosted by our local area credit union's. They were having a tough time finding volunteers to fill portions of the walk from Columbus to Cleveland, about 10 miles a day. They mentioned I could bike it if I wanted, you don't have to ask me twice. Landon skipped school Thursday and we had an epic journey together on the Sippo Valley Trail in Dalton. Then I went back out Monday morning a chugged out another leg of the fund raiser on the CVNP towpath trail in an absolute downpour that lasted the entire morning. We met up with the RV at the end of the ride and passed on the marching battalion from the Summit Chapter to the Cleveland Chapter. The local credit union's have raised over $80,000.00 so far.

Dang it felt good to get back on a bike! I've been having goodtimes building trail and getting things aligned down at Vulture's Knob that I forgot how it felt to hammer out 20 miles, I did not even the feel the rain and cold as it was just me, my bike, and good ole mother nature. This was what I needed to kick start riding again. Now I just need to figure out how to find the time.

Here is a segment of a write up from the www.marchingmiles.com website.

The uncertainly of weather loomed, the rain stayed north and south as the clouds parted and we stayed dry as we decided to grab the bikes for the trek from Dalton to Massillon. This day was made much more exciting by having the addition of the youngest marcher/rider, Landon Daum, the 4 year old son of Kevin Daum . We started off from Dalton about 11:30, planning to reach Massillon and eventually Massillon Area Credit Union by 12:30. FirstEnergy Credit Union CEO Tim Baker joined in on the trek. However, little Landon had a different time schedule and he wanted to ride, walk, then run, then ride again. He wanted to stop at a few of the 50 bridges we crossed and look for sharks and whales. We came to one bridge that was burnt down and Landon suggested we swing across on a vine. It was great having Landon and he is also one of the many success stories of Akron Children's hospital as he was rushed there one year after his birth with a serious infection that wa treated with the upmost care, expertise and professionalism.

Check out Landon's new BMX jersey. He is a member of a new BMX team the Mike J put together that helps promote youth BMX riding and has several professional racers to mentor the kids. Mike just found a mini race bike for Landon so our first race will be coming soon with dad running along side the entire time. I can't wait!

Landon giving the thumbs up on the Sippo Valley trail

Final Vultures Knob trophies

2009-04-29T13:05:00.002-05:00

These were custom designed sterling silver for series champion and bronze for runner up. Jen Green's custom design headbadges. I'm leaning towards giving these as the year end awards every year from here on out? Let me know what you think.

VKnob addition to the family

2009-04-17T13:30:00.005-05:00

"A GROOVY PUP"
What do you get when 1 local custom frame builder leaves his purebred Miniture Austrailian Shepard alone with an Austrailian Blue Heeler aka the Knob local....The perfect trail dog to run alongside with our german shepard high jumping frisbee mix Titan. This batch of pups has traits that should be mid-sized, highly intellectual and very active. We'll see but so far very true. When I first saw these dogs I knew one would be coming home with us. Landon and Connie choose "good ole blue eyes" of the bunch. We've had him for two weeks, and from the instint he came home he is been a welcome addition to the family. He is virtually housebroken which is quite impressive in such a short period ot time. Landon named him "Lighting"

Lighting's first day, Landan tries to cheer up little Light'n who was kinda missing his brothers and sisters.

Landon jumping around at the first sight of spring and rare Ohio sunshine on a blue sky day.

Vulture Knob - mock up award

2009-04-17T13:04:00.005-05:00

Been tossing ideas around in my head for the Vulture's Knob 2008 series awards ever since it ended last year. Massive amounts of ideas have been kicked around in my head and amongst the VKnob Crew. For the longest time I've dug Jen Green's "Revolution Cycle Jewelry" custom work so I contacted her and she designed custom headbages for the top 2 in each class. They turned out a tad smaller then I imaged, but I'm a 6'-4" rider and my headtube is huge, amongst other things. I just received the finished product and I'm stoked on the way they turned out. Now try to figure out a way to mount them inorder to present them to the winner and the first loser. I decided on sterling silver for the champion, and bronze for the runner-up. I hope they are received well, if so I plan on making them every year for the series winners.

Here is photo of one of the mock ups. To see the finished product come out to the race tomorrow. To take one home just win the series...easy...right!

I'll post photos of the finished product after the race. Let me know what you think.

Another day at the Vulture's Knob

2009-03-29T20:00:00.006-05:00

Alot of projects got wrapped up on Saturday. Things are starting to look good. We went out for a spin after busting out all day working and was suprised to find 97% of the trail dry and ripp'n. Its still March! We are going to try to drop more large stone into the few wet spots that don't have drainage options or redesign to a higher line. Other then a small punch list of trail polishing projects before the first XC race on April 18, the biggest project left is taking the old house down. We've been trying to stay green by pulling wood and material from that old house, but the pile of broken house don't look pretty...stay calm, we hope to have that cleared in a couple of months.

Shawns Teeter - the beginings to a new DH / Freeride line.

MC Flow - carving out the freshness
one of many banked turns to come...can you say "improved flow"?
new water station for the XC racers
another water station
Testing the banner placement of the new finish line, this should make set up and tear down on race day alot easier. We placed hooks in all the poles to enable quick banner placement. No more thankless pounding of poles to setup raceday.

Vulture's Knob Update 3-22-09

2009-03-23T12:59:00.004-05:00

A few more happenings at the Knob from this past weekend.
The scoring shoot is taking shape.
Thanks again for those that have lent a hand with the trailwork!

Drainage system for the water that comes from the pavalion.

The berm is getting its finishing touch

The entry into the new shoot.

Vulture's Knob

2009-03-15T19:52:00.005-05:00

Givin back a little lov'n to the venue that got me into mountain biking. All winter long the VKnob Crew has been kicking ideas and now that the snow is gone and while we still have line of sight before everything greens in - the goodness of trail building has begun. Here's a preview of new happenings at the the Knob.

The new armoured switch back which eliminites the billy goat hill climb, sad to see the goat gone but nifty stuff is in the works for that area. What's that below...is that a bridge over the rock tunnel?

The XC course will go under this bridge twice.

The new arch bridge will carry the freeride crew over the XC course, no more interference...NICE

The look off the drop onto the arch and over the XC course

The new finish line is taking shape. No more crazy maze like finish.

The new finish trail will take you behind the pavillion twice.

Commute Accessory - an Evil Necessity

2009-02-11T14:59:00.004-05:00

These handlebar end plugs are all the rage these days. F all those close drive-bys by drivers talking on cell phones while drinking coffee and smoking a cig all while yelling at the kids to be quite. OH YA...these babys spell sweet revenge. Can't tell ya how many times I've been rubbed by car mirrors and such - This is your fair warning, don't brush me with your vehicle or your going to the auto body shop!

Seat Warmer

2009-02-11T14:50:00.002-05:00

After a bunch of cold ass days on the bike, I finally had enough and came up with a way to keep my ass warm. It also serves to warm up a few drinks post ride.

Vulture's Knob and other happenings

2008-05-19T12:31:00.004-05:00

I've been getting alot of "What you've been up to's" lately and realized I have not been posting much here. It's not been from lack of not happenings, quite the opposite. After racing 4 100 milers and numorous other races last year I decided to take a rest this year (particially due to wife's work schedule and lack of training time) but this has afforded me the time to spend more time with my son then ever before and seeing the world through the eyes of a 3 year old is truely an amazing journey! But on the flip side, in addition to running the Big Valley Race Festival in September I got rope-a-doped into running the Legenday Vulture's Knob Mountain Bike Course. Not only the 6 race series but the entire facility...125 acres of kick ass terrain to play with - the Knob was my main MTBR influence, the place that started my racing 10 years ago, well Camp Manatoc was my first race but this was my first race series and I did alot of the 24 hour races here.

First course of business was whipping the course back to shape and many, many, many people came out to lend a hand. I think one day after it snowed in January/February we had over 30 guys show up to lend a hand and got a 3/4 mile section of new trail completed. Its amazing when you get alot of guys with trail building knowledge together, alot gets done fast! I want to say again,,,thanks to everyone who lent and is giving their support for the Vulture's Knob Revival, both individuals and sponsors, its been great working and learning from everyone. After getting snowed and rained out in future trail days we thought we'd come up short on our punch list before the first race in April but we all pulled together and over 1.5 miles of new trail was completed and nearly all the problem spots have been addressed, bridges have been rebuilt including the suspension bridge and the famed cradle. We have some more new trail in the works but we're also looking at bringing the hard efforts of the freeride scene back to the Knob and we are looking at zoning out a few sections for the Downhill/Freeride course and a jump park.

All this has meant nearly every weekend I've been making some effort to be in Wooster to give some lovin to the trail system and thus my fitness has taken a beating this year. I've ridden my bike less then 10 times this year but the funny thing is, I'm not bummed out at all. Last year I was focused on getting 10-20 hours of saddle time each and every week and I'm not missing that at all this year. It seems as if the year on, year off approach might help find some balance in the mental and physical side of things. I'm just plain having a good time building trail, its what I love to do and I missed that while logging the miles for the hundies. Once Connie gets the summer off from her new teaching gig I'll start riding to work again (50 mile round trip) and I'm hoping that gets my fitness back on track.

Here are some photos of the Cradle at Vulture's Knob. It actually broke during the first race we had in April, 125 racers beat the snot out of this wonder bridge, luckly we had made a seperate bypass bridge a month early do to some quick thinking by Jason the cradle was closed before anyone got hurt and the bypass was utilized. We are getting ready for our second race of the 6 race series this Saturday night. We're lighting the burn pile on fire during the race and a DJ will be spinning a few tunes as we kick back and enjoy a few beers from on of our new sponsors. Stay tuned for more updates.

The beginning, tearing out broken boards and repracing

Never notice how much vert it until I was standing next to it

The new trail leading into the Cradle

Take a walk with me on El Camino de Rey

2008-04-24T12:59:00.002-05:00

My Commute to work - Bicycle Trip Calculator

2007-11-24T19:20:00.002-05:00

Check out this calculator...tells you how much money you save in gas, how many calories burned and how much carbon emissions are saved by commuting to work by bike rather then sitting in car. This year I was trying to ride 1-2 times per week (a few times 3-4) from Medina to Akron which is about 50 miles round trip. I've stopped commuting for the winter, trying to get motivated to get out and ride to work in the cold dark Ohio weather is rough. But I'm working on it! Why...check out all the reasons below.

Commute Calculator Link

My Result
Per Day Per Week Per Year
$36.50 $73.00 $3,650.00

Calories burned:
1,800 calories 3,600 calories 180,000 calories

Reduction in carbon monoxide emissions:
2.56 lbs 5.12 lbs 256.00 lbs

This kinda sums it up!

Copied from the SmartTrips.org website

There Are Lots Of Reasons To Commute By Bicycle
You save money on fuel, wear and tear on your vehicle and may even reduce your insurance rates. No parking problems. Almost faster than driving.

Health
Bicycle commuting is a great way to squeeze regular exercise into a hectic schedule. Commuting time can be used to stay in shape instead of sitting frustrated in traffic. Bicycle commuting can get you to work on time more often, put you in a better mood, and help you to do your job better. And when you are in better shape, you will get sick less often.
Studies show that health benefits of bike riding range from reducing risk of heart disease, maintaining or reducing weight, toning muscles and even improving cardio-vascular fitness. And remember, cycling reduces pollution and traffic congestion.

Mobility
Even the most powerful sports car crawls in congested traffic while bicyclists ride around it. And parking a car can be a time consuming hassle, but you can park a bike quickly and close to your destination.

Economics
Add up what you spend getting to work every day. Bicycle commuting saves you parking fees, fuel costs, auto maintenance costs, and transit fees. A new bicycle and cycling gear would pay for itself in a few months. The largest costs of automobile ownership are paid up front, insurance and car payments. You might be able to save as much as 25% of your income if you can replace your car or second car with a combination of bicycling, transit, an occasional cab or rented car.

Bicycling Benefits the Environment
Autos are the single largest source of U.S. air pollution. Short trips that are more bikeable are up to three times more polluting per mile than long trips. An average four-mile round-trip bike commute prevents nearly 15 pounds of auto air pollution from contaminating your air. When it substitutes for shorter auto trips, the bicycle eliminates 3.6 pounds of auto pollutants per mile. More bicycle use means less benzene, cyanide, lead, carbon monoxide, CFC's, sulfates and ozone in the air we breathe. Since the bicycle season matches the ground-level ozone season, by biking instead of driving, you contribute to pollution prevention when it is most needed.

A few more Big Valley Race Camp Manatoc Photos

2007-10-11T11:36:00.000-05:00

A few more photos just surfaced from the bike 'n' tikes kids festival at the Big Valley Race courtesy of Drew Smith. I'll try to get the rest up on the BigValley website in the next couple of days. Huge props goes to Mike Johnson for managing the kids races on saturday, they did an awesome job, so good in fact that a day hasn't gone by that Landon has not asked to go and ride his bike, "Bike Race Daddy" "go". I'm a proud dad!

Beach Volleyball update - Undefeated season

2007-09-26T12:30:00.000-05:00

Beach volleyball in Ohio, who’d thunk it? My wife of course. As most of you know she is a volleyball lunatic. She played throughout high school and went on to play in college. Last year for her birthday I got her tickets to the AVP in Chicago and she went ballistic. I don’t think she was that excited for our marriage. (I’m beginning to see where I rank) At the event she knew everyone, got pictures with her favorite pro players and began my lessons on the rules of the game. She’s been trying to get me to play the last couple of years but I think has been to embarrassed at my skill level and never put together a team I was worthy of playing on. This year that changed, she finally dropped down to my level of play and we got on a coed team. I got a call from my little brother, Todd who is living in Kent OH. They have a beach volleyball league going on and asked if we’d be interested in playing the next session. This was my chance, “Ya…we’re in” How hard can this be, I thought to myself as we drove up the first game. 10 minutes later, sweat dripping from my forehead and breathing hard I realized, dang this is tough, harder then I thought. We were losing our first game and I was thinking it was because of me, I think I missed my first spike, put the first serve into the net…well - we battled back and won the first game and then went on to be the only undefeated team in season play. 24 – 0. I think I was the only 6’-4” guy who could not spike. Towards the end of the season I was spiking 30% of the sets, but man…the other 70% were ugly, I could not get the timing and angle right but I did get slightly better as time progressed, which I guess is all I could ask for seeing I’ve never played before. Connie was very encouraging with her smiling, snickering and all out falling to the ground in hysterical laughter when I would be set up for the perfect spike and I’d shank it. The season ended with us going into the tournament. Since we were undefeated we had a bye and did not start play until 10:30pm, for us that is late. We were both up at 5:30 in the morning, Connie went to work, and I jumped on the bike and rode 1 ½ hours to work in Akron. Well the opposing team climbed up the tourney ladder and was hot after just playing, we had not played at all and here we where in the quarter finals…needless to say we gave away our first game and lost, all of us miss-serving about 9 points…it was ugly. We battled back and won the next two games and took the set. This moved us into the semi-finals and we had our next game at 11:30pm. Once again we played awful. We gave away many points and we lost the set 2-1 to a team we had swept in the regular season. Still pondering what happened - we simply had no mojo that night. The other team did not play good either, it was an ugly semi-final game, I apologize to anyone who was watching. It was a good chance to see how my wife played under pressure…whooo..look out! Intense! I think I played the worst I’ve played all season. It was probably a good thing we lost though, the other bracket in the tournament was behind schedule and if we’d won we’d be in the finals with the match not starting til after 1:00am.

We had fun and I learned a lot. My wife kicks ass at volleyball...this is her game! She has a wicked serve and would make a great coach as she broke it down for me many times. I tried to make my highly critical wife proud, but I’m not sure I succeeded. I did get a couple high-fives from her when I did get a strong spike or a good block. The real test we be if she ever asks me to play on another team with her again, but 24-0 aint bad…is it?

Reagan Park Time Trial - 4th Place

2007-09-18T12:55:00.001-05:00

Finally home court advantage. After traveling to Florida, Tennessee, Michigan and Colorado to race this year it was nice to be able to leave my house on my bike and ride 3 miles over to the local trails to enter a local race. The 3rd Annual Reagan Park Time Trail was Sunday and consists of a blend of old school and new school trail design. Tight, curvy and technical is the first half of the trail verses open, free flowing contour line CAMBA designed trails of the last 3 miles of the course. The best overall skilled rider would win this race…and that would be none other then my Solon team mate Steve Twinning who set a blistering pace at 33:46 minutes. I went off in the 10th starting position and decided to take the first half slow and smooth. That lasted about 10 seconds when I decided to stomp on the pedals a bit, but after the first small hill I felt the lactic acid build up a bit so I backed off and went back to the original game plan of easy the first half and then stepping up the pace on the wide open trail at the finish. The tactic seemed to work decent as I felt good the entire race and was able to maintain a good tempo. I came across the finish line at 35:56 which was good for 4th place. Jeff Cochran took 2nd place at 35:27 and my team mate Ross Clark finished 3rd at 35:30. The Solon Team almost took a sweep of the podium with 1st, 3rd, 4th & Bob Rodgers roll'n in at 5th place. Dustin, Jason, Mike & Larry did a great job running the event. From a rider perspective everything looked well organized the trail was in outstanding shape!

2007 Leadville 100 Start - WOW!

2007-09-13T12:36:00.000-05:00

Landon's First Podium

2007-09-13T11:54:00.000-05:00

Landon's been long anticipating his first bike race and what not a better venue then the Big Valley Race Bike 'n' Tikes Kids Festival. Landon lined up with the other mini-mites (2-3yr olds) and was eager to get things rolling. He was counting down and inching forward before the start gun went off. Landon and I talked before the race and decided not to go out too strong and save it for the end of the race. So the flag dropped and the kids went off, Landon, Emily and 2 others must have been listening to our strategy as they stayed back a little also. Landon hasn't got the pedaling thing down yet so I pushed him the entire way while he steered his bike like a drunk'n sailer. We rode and ran down the course and the finish line was in sight, we stepped it up and just as it looked like a sixth place finish for us someone fell and Landon pushed on and crossed the finish line in 5th place. He got his first trophy and was so proud he took it to school on Tuesday to show his friends. He are a few photos for Landon's proud day!

2007-08-31T09:49:00.000-05:00

Not much riding since the big Leadville 100 race, been super busy prepping for the Big Valley Race at Camp Manatoc which is a race my team and I put on Sept 8th & 9th. Its been concentrating on the detail side of things such as insurance, awards, 9.5 miles of course prep, web stuff. The flyers from Broken Spokes Studios looked great this year. check out the event website at www.bigvalleyrace.com

GREAT NEWS: Connie finally got a teaching gig, she's teaching 7th and 8th grade health over at North Royalton, since this is her first semester she's been super busy getting all her leason plans and materials ready. We hope to enjoy the sunshine this weekend by getting some riding in at Manatoc this weekend between prepping the course.

2007 Leadville 100 Mountain Bike Race

2007-08-23T13:18:00.000-05:00

Sub-Eight Dream'n

They call it the race across the sky, endurance extreme. They fill you tons of cool aid and tell you to dig deep, go further. I can save em a lot of valuable thin Colorado air and ink by simply self titling the Leadville 100 with one very descriptive word…sadistic. (1. The deriving of pleasure, or the tendency to derive pleasure, from cruelty. 2. Extreme cruelty.) That was the only description that came to my mind as I pushed my bike up the top of Columbine Mountain at 12,800 feet then again at the lower portion of the power line climb with 80 degrees of high altitude sunshine evaporating the ever so valuable life source; h20, from every remaining living cell in my body. Oh the flipp’n pleasure from this cruelty. The great thing about our human body is we come with a turbo charged air conditioner. When we get cooked, baked, and simply run out of water our built in chemistry cools our body down rather quickly. A nice, very calming cooling effect combined with a change in skin tone keeps you feeling downright cozy. So how did I find myself back in the thin air of Leadville Colorado for a 3rd time climbing over 12,000 feet of vertical elevation and shooting for another sub-nine finish?

Hey Kevin, we’re all signing up for Leadville, you should do it again, it’ll be a great time. By the way, they’ll be 2-3 ex Tour de France racers there, along with a 2 time eco-challenge winner and various other long distance cycling freaks and who that’s guy with all the hype, the 2006 Tour de France winner, ya him -Floyd Landis and there are tiny rumors stirring in certain “BOGUS” cycling publications that sir Lance might appear. Yep, I fell for it. 6 of us Ohio boys sent in our race applications. It would be a party with tons of great riding climaxing with a 103 mile race of truth. I was roped in again! But due to the added publicly of “famous” riders only three of us got accepted into the race despite an added 200 entries bringing the total to a massive 900 entrants. So Ross, Ken and I settled into the mystic and sadistical rocky mountain high of hurt and fortitude that is known as the Leadville 100.

This year I only had 1 week to acclimate for the race. (Mistake #1) Due to all the doping allegations and the unraveling of the sport at the professional level I’ve been able to learn a lot; most importantly you can’t win clean. No wonder I’ve never been able to pull off a big victory. So I’ve been picking up books such as “From Lance to Landis” and taking a lot of notes. Recently I’ve learned to give myself injections and clean my own blood after hard training rides. I found my trusty 4 legged companion; Titan, has the cleanest blood with the highest hemocit level, (Whoa Neely)…I’m a fast f’er when infused with that stuff, but Connie caught me several times licking myself so no more dog blood. But despite all the new secret training, medical experimentation and consultations with an unknown doctor I thought it best to sit low this year and leave the blood bags and paraphernalia in my shoebox at my friend’s house tucked neatly in the fridge behind the Le Fin du Monde (beer) in Medina Ohio and try one last clean race. The only new substances I tried was increasing my Iron and Vitamin C consumption and dosing up on Echinacea a bit to see if it would help increase the red blood cell count with the altitude. So to do this clean we decided to spend a couple days working up to altitude to avoid the swirling vortex of AMS. (acute mountain sickness) We started at 850 feet above sea level for 355 days in Medina Ohio and then moved up to 6500 ft for two days, then over to Crested Butte for 2 days at 8000+ feet then finally over to Frisco at 9100 ft for 4 days before the race. This supposedly allows time for your body to create more red blood cells so the body can process and convert the short supply of oxygen to the muscles or whatever. In the past Leadville experiences I gave myself two weeks at altitude, more would help but this year given the time frame this was the only choice (1 week).

Fast forward to night before the race. No pressure here. I was still breathing heavy every time I climbed the stairs of the condo to get ready for the race. A lot of family showed up this year to give me and my teammates, Ross and Ken much needed support. My wife’s parents from Ohio and her aunt and uncle from Florida made their first journey to see what a 100 mile endurance race is all about. They’ve seen enough pictures and read the reviews, time to experience the experience in person and what not a better atmosphere then Leadville. My parents also made the journey along with my wife and two year old son Landon. (we choose a name close to Lance and Landis but are holding off any name association pending any future arbitration rulings) We all sat down and enjoyed a fantastic pasta and chicken dinner from our head team chief. (Mistake #2) Then Ross and I packed up and headed over to crash with Ken in his RV parked down at the friendly RV Park near Turquoise Lake.

Since I hit the sub nine time of 8:48 two years ago, I was eager to improve on my time and set up two goals, finishing sub-8 and a back up goal of finishing sub 8:30. Why those times? In the previous two 100’s I’ve done this year I hit 8:03 at the Cohutta 100 in Tennessee and 8:07 at the LumberJack 100 in Michigan. Those races actually contained single track and a bit of technical riding, Leadville is all fire road…realistic goals right?
Five, Four, Three, twoone…BAMB we’re off! You gotta check out the videos of the start, I’ve never seen anything like this in mountain bike racing. 900 racers taking off. Ross and I got with the 10-11 hours starters/finishers because we got to the start a bit late and found absolutely no space to put our bikes in the sub-nine staging area. Ken was in the top 100 last year and was upfront relaxing with the fast guys (lucky dude). It took a minute or so for the accordion to stretch allowing our wheels to get rolling, then it was a desperate and hilarious video game trying to crawl, sneak and finagle our way into the top 100. 3 miles later I had moved up into the top 50 and the police escort drove off…race on. Damn that was a lot of unneeded stress trying to get up front, I had no intentions of getting off and walking the first climb and knew you have to be up front at this point, it only takes 1 rider to dismount and then all chaos can prevail behind him. I felt decent, spent more energy then I wanted getting up front but non the less I was there. I settled down into a decent tempo and followed the train up and over St Kevin and then up to the power line where Ross caught up to me. A small group of us soldiered up the hill and the decent down the power line was status quo. Ross was riding full suspension, I was riding a hard tail so he pulled out of site on the down hill but I caught him and a small group before the fish hatchery and we formed a fairly organized double pace line and began picking people off. By the time we made it to the first check point we had worked into the top 30 and I was on track for my sub-eight and feeling good. We hammered through the pipeline over to Twin Lakes. Connie, Karen and Tiff greeted us with smiles and gave us what we needed to for the push up Columbine. We set up our support tent before the scorer’s tent, so when Ross and I passed through I was in 42nd place and he was in 45th. 2:36 elapsed time - 6 minutes off the top 20 guys - my fastest time compared to last 2 years. Legs still felt good, heart rate was as normal as can be for an Ohio boy but something was stirring in the stomach, I kinda dismissed it as temporary and began the assault on Columbine. This is always where 6-4foot 190lb sea level dude gets crushed, but I was trying to redeem myself this year for I trained as much hills as I could this year, but soon realized something was amiss as I was slowing down and riders began to pass me. My stomach was beginning to inflate. I felt my skin stretching and imaginary weight gain in first two miles of the climb. I laughed! I pushed on and backed off the pace, hoping the GI issues were only temporary, by the time I reached the aid station at 12,800 feet I had dropped back to 91st place with a time of 4.29. OUCH! I was losing my split time goals. Ross had passed me at the bottom of the climb and said he would notify EMS at the top to prepare for the first Leadville 100 race day birth. I tried to hang on his wheel but no dice, I offered him my extra 30 lbs of body weight in exchange for is extra 5 lbs of bike weight, but he flipped me off and rightfully so and finished the climb in 77th place at 4:27.

Pipeline1 Twin Lakes1 ColumbineMine Twin Lakes2 Pipeline2 Finish
2007 Actual - 1.54 2:36 4:29 5:05 6:05 8:50:30
2005 Actual - 1:58 2:42 4:39 5:12 6:08 8:48:56
Sub 8 goals - 2:00 2:48 4:16 4:51 5:38 7:57:22
Sub 8:30 goals - 2:00 2:46 4:25 4:55 5:50 8:29:25

I quickly grabbed two pieces of watermelon and hopped back on my bike. The first part of the decent is brutal because the clean line is taken by the climbers. So off in the rough rock, my arms and legs were my suspension as I tried to float over the rocks. I wanted off that mountain fast, we were above the tree line, snow could still be seen on adjacent peaks and the oxygen level was super low for us Ohio boys. Quick decent = more oxygen!? Once I cleared the top mile of rough rock and hundreds of ascenders, I went to hammer down and nothing, my chain was locked up. I slowed down and tried to get it back in the chain rings but soon realized the chain was wrapped around my crank twice. I dismounted, thinking I would have to do major repair but thanks to years spent mastering the rubuix cube I was able to detangle the chain puzzle in seconds and I was off. I hammered the hill and soon caught my teammate Ross who appeared to have settled down in a lazy boy at the Columbine aid station and ate as much as he could. We made it back to Twin Lakes outbound checkpoint together at 5:05, I was 15 minutes off my split sub eight goal. It was amazing, no matter how terrible or good you felt, when you passed through check point zones you got a great dose of feel good energy from the 1000’s support crews and families. It was the closest atmosphere to the Tour de France I’ll ever experience.

Ross and I took off and he helped pull me up the first small hill, then we exchanged pulls and dropped a few guys and caught a few more. When we reached the small open desert climb out the pipeline outbound trail I looked up and it looked like another flipp’n mountain. My stomach was in full arrest, churn’n and burn’n. I was sure a content cleansing moment was near. I had dumped most my Hammer stuff and gone to backup nutrition of Coke and water. My stomach was stretched to the max, I was turning white and a Leadville born mutant was eminent, it was only a matter of time. Ross saw me drop off the pace, we dismounted and began the hike a bike. Despite my long stride and mountain climbing finesse, Ross and the others easily pulled away. Ross slowed a bit and encouraged me, “Hurry up Sally”. I stepped it up in my mind but my body did not respond. I needed to back off and race my own race. This is the point that you train to avoid but sometimes find yourself alone, body failing you dig into your inner reserves and trick yourself and play the little mental games to push on when common sense says to stop and go grab a cold one. I also got severally pissed off, all the time spent training this year, my family was out here in full force, I was hitting my splits and now I was faltering. Flippn-ME! What did I do different, why now? I hadn’t a clue during the race. I turned up my MP3 player and tried to find an easy tempo, I went through several emotional fights with myself but eventually the coke, water and decreased tempo allowed my body to slightly recover, I began to push the pace again but just did not have the mojo I’m used to having at this point in the race. I was only faster in my mind! I came in at the Pipepline 2 checkpoint at 6:05. I was given all my Hammer Nutrition stuff and the thought of drinking it nearly made me sick, I immediately threw the Sustained Energy and Perp back on the ground and opted for another Coke, water and Heed/SE mix. I put my head down for a moment, I felt unusually wasted. They said Ross was 1 minute ahead and that was all it took to get me going again. He must have had high altitude issues also, for he has finished top 10 in many of the east coast 100 milers the past 2 years and here we were both dropping from being fiercely competitive into survival mode, would we even finish? They did not tell me at the time, but I was white as a ghost! Maybe it was my spirit that was getting me through as my body tried to catch up?

From this point, I caught a small group and we paced over to the power line climb. I tried to ride the plank across the creek and nearly fell in, what a wuss! I dropped the gears and began the brutal lower portion of the power line climb. Once again I made it up close to the straight away and then the vortex of thin air and zapping power lines ripped the strength from me, my head was spinning hard and I was fighting for each breath. I knew better but once again pushed that damn climb to hard and had to put my head on the handle bars. Its not that this climb is not climbable but it was not climbable, does that make any sense? Rumors are Floyd and Dave also walked immediately after this photo was taken. After I recovered, I hiked a bit more then jumped back on the bike and pedaled all the way to the top. From here on I basically rode the race alone. Connie met me at the bottom of the power line decent for a bit of encouragement. St Kevin’s was an uneventful climb but I was stoked to hear my name by the volunteers and given a fresh bottle of water without stopping. I looked at my watch; I was close to the sub-nine again. I was beginning to regain consciousness, or so I thought and made the push to the finish. I was looking for someone to share the pace with but no one was in front and nobody was in back. Somehow I managed to get to the Boulevard, just when you think you’re finished you begin the climb to the finish line. It’s a 3 mile at a slight gradient, mid-tempo pace but seems to never end. I saw five different false finishes. Damn my mind is weak today. I finally saw riders ahead but could not bridge the gap, although they got closer. I dumped out onto the final road leading into town, looked at my watch and saw I had 15 minutes til the 9 hour cut off time, this usually puts you in the top 50 or so riders but not this year! I crossed the finish line at 8:50:30. 3 minutes slower than my 2005 time and 3 minutes behind by teammate Ross. Toasted, wasted, and spent; my handlebars became my pillow again. I was told I still had no skin tone looked a tad dehydrated. I was eventually helped off my trusty Specialized steed and Connie began shoving recovery drinks in my face. She knows me. I wanted to dump em but knew I needed to get stuff into my body.

So I guess I should be happy with my finish, coming from 850 feet above sea level and being able to finish in the top 10% is good egh… Dunno, I was pushing for that sub-eight and maybe that is what keeps everyone coming back to Leadville, not necessarily to win the race, but to win your own race. To set individual goals and attack them with feverish vigor and passion. It became very apparent to me what I did different this year, I was in suburb shape compared to previous years but I only spent 8 days at altitude but the big mistake was the big pasta and chicken dinner 10 hours before the race. I never eat that much before a 100 mile race, sure 2-3 days before I scarf down some sizable carbo meals but I just couldn’t resist this year, our team chef whipped up one hell of a meal and I ate it all and wanted more. This had to be a major factor in the GI distress experienced during the race. I didn’t feel I went out to hard, considering the efforts of the other 100’s I’ve done this year, I guess it just wasn’t meant to be. So that leaves me with the empty satisfaction that I can and will do better. The only question is why I would put myself through this again. Only those that have done the Leadville 100, the Race across the Sky will ever know!

2007 Leadville 100

2007-08-15T09:36:00.000-05:00

For whatever reason, reentry back to life in Ohio has been tougher this year. Haven't had time to finish my race review but I'll get it posted soon with photos.

Race had its up and downs, I achieved 2 out of 3 goals... first just finishing, second finishing under 9 hours, third finishing sub-8:30 was not to be. (stomach issues and dehydration)

They had 100+ sub-nine finishers...a lot of fast mofo's this year. The atmosphere was huge, it was like a mini tour de france at the check points.

Ross - 8:47.00
Kevin - 8:50:30
Ken - DNF

A huge thanks to Connie's aunt and uncle from Florida and her parents who flew out to support us and again to my parents for everything from race support to babysitting. And of course thanks to my wife for getting us through a third Leadville and to Karen and Tiff for their race support.

Details coming soon.

Leadville 100 training

2007-07-17T13:01:00.001-05:00

It's all in the bank now. Not much more training I can do to prepare for the Leadville 100. I might do the 6 hours of power this weekend along with the training Euro Hill race in Hinckley Thursday evening but thats about it. The last 10 days were my last hard cycle in training, I managed 450 miles of saddle time the last 10 days. So now I sit back and let my body recover, rest and rebuild for the Leadville showdown. Bring it on!

I'm aiming for a sub 8:30 finish which should put me top 50 but secretly I'm looking to pull out a sub 8 performance. The huge variable is the thin, thin, air and long sustained climbs of Leadville. If my lungs can find the little o2 and convert all should be good! If not I'll just sit in and enjoy the ride and soak up all the goodness that is the Leadville 100.

25 days and counting

2007-07-17T12:48:00.000-05:00

The Leadville 100 is right around the corner. Its been getting a ton of press lately and if all the rumors are true its gonna be a crazy circus like atmosphere. I'll be packing my clown feet and red fluffly nose. I might even dye my hair. First off, they took an additional 200+ racers this year so thats over 900 racers lining up. Then add the Floyd Landis and Lance Armstrong, (both chemically enhanced Tour de France winners) rumors and that place is gonna be wild.

is this the confirming article or another rumor Leadville Showdown

or this one... cronicle

lastly...the scouting article

I guess we won't truely know until the day of the race. Game on!

GOAL ATTAINED!

2007-07-10T07:30:00.000-05:00

100 mile century ride in under 5 hours, average speed of 20 mph.

We’ve been doing these centuries for quite some time now, it’s not a race, but an organized ride where you follow routes of painted arrows on the road and have the option to stop at rest areas full of food and beverages. This ride was called the ABC ride “Absolutely Beautiful Country” ride, rather flat but a lot of rollers and a few small hills. Every year we get stronger and faster, the last couple of times we’ve averaged 17-19 mph and we would think lets push for 20mph next time but it never happened. With the crew that showed up this year I knew it would be possible. Brett, Ross, Bob, Jason, Juan, Ken and Ray. I’ll spare the boring details but mission accomplished. We finished 100 miles in under 5 hours with an average rolling speed slightly over 20mph. The ride served its purpose; it was absolutely a great training ride.

Summer...Summer...Summer Time

2007-07-04T18:05:00.000-05:00

4 GENERATIONS OF DAUMS

2007-07-04T17:56:00.000-05:00

Photo taken at the 4th of July family get together at casa da Daums in Medina
Grandpa James Daum
Great Grandpa William Daum
Landon Daum
Kevin Daum

32nd Annual Medina Twin Sizzler Road Race

2007-07-04T17:54:00.000-05:00

A group of mountain bikers at a road race....scary sight.

On the bike commute to work this morning I couldn’t help be replay the Twin Sizzler race in my head a couple of times. It was ours for the taking and with a little more road experience we might have been on top of things a little more, but do I really care, dunno…it was a road race…Leadville is 36 days away! It is what it is…I’ll take 5th place.

Typical road race from the start, a few accelerations to catch faux breaks. Before we knew it we were at Kennard Rd hill. This little hill always hurts more then it should, very deceiving. As usual this is where the pack gets splintered, last year a small group got away and stayed away so I wanted to be up front. The attack went off as scripted, about 10 guys got off in front of me but I slowly started picking em off and before I knew it I was second behind the AF racer then went right past him. Did not expect this at all but it was a happy revelation that my hill climbing has improved, and with the 1 hour climbs of Colorado looming I feel very comfortable. What to do now?... my HR was maxed, I’m out front…do I break and hope a small group forms…probably… but did not have it, I settled back and waited, a group formed, the pack was cut in half and nothing exciting to report on the remaining15 mile journey into town…until the final sprint of course.

As we approached the final 2 miles into town, the road complexion changes dramatically as we enter the industrial side of town, beat up and broken concrete, huge cracks and holes that try to claim the $5000 race bikes, $1000.00 wheel sets, and limbs and bones of the racers themselves.…none of us can figure out, for safety sakes, why they don’t move the road over one more to ensure safety…but enough ranting…they’re idiots..ok stop…. it’s a citizens race…what do you expect…???… I worked my way up front, but then got caught behind some cashed out riders on one of the hard accelerations into town, with guys flying by me on my left side and slippery slow Joe in front of me I had no option but to hop into the nasty cut up broken concrete to the right and try to float my way to the front….it kinda worked, as I got towards the front another big attack hit and 2 guys got away, I was 4th or 5th making the hard left turn over the rail tracks. Then I expect the guy next to me to swing wide to take the hard right into the final 400 yard sprint into town but this jacko stays tight and blocks me into a tight turn towards the inner curb. Feeling a tad perplexed I did not want to bump with this guy and did not know what was happening behind me so I grabbed a fist full of brakes at the worst possible time. Everyone else was carrying there speed into the turn, not me…I had to mash down on the pedals and get back up to speed then continue the effort for another 300 yards. Damn that sucked to watch those 2-3 riders get away but it is what it is. We mass sprinted for 3-6th place. Preliminary results are me and Brett Davis stroking over the finish line in 5 and 6 position.

Should I have yelled at that dud, been more aggressive into the turn and forced him to grab brake….dunno. The thoughts and replays kept floating into my head as I watched the sun try to poke through the overcast sky this morning. Overall I’m satisfied, over the years I’ve gone from being dropped by the expert group, to hanging, to snagging a top five…so it’s all good. Bring on the dirt, rocks and the thin air at 12,000 feet.

I did not stop my computer at race end, but for what I can gather; our average speed was 26.5 mph on this 27 mile course. On the final sprint I hit over 1000 watts. I’ll try to peal off some more data from the power meter tonight, its all new to me.

Afterwards, about 30 racers and their families attending our Reload Breakfast feast at casa de Daums. It was a good day!

Nothing left to do but SMILE, SMILE, SMILE

2007-06-22T07:29:00.000-05:00

NEED I SAY ANYTHING

BEFORE HAIRCUT

AFTER HAIRCUT

SAY CHEESE

Lumberjack 100

2007-06-19T12:18:00.000-05:00

I tell ya what; I honestly don’t know how I lived without GPS in the cars all these years. Friday I plugged the Lat and Long coordinates of the LumberJack 100 located in the Manistee National Forest in Michigan, up there between Grand Rapids and Traverse City and pointed the Jeep in the direction of the arrows. 7 hours later we arrived at the Big M ski area in Michigan. No maps, no planning, no worries!

We saw Ross and Tif as we pulled in and went off to pre-ride the first 7 miles to see what the self titled Big M’fer is all about. Fun, smooth flowing single track with small pits of sand thrown in to keep ya on your toes is what it is. No huge ½ hour climbs, no rocks, hardly any roots. Connie was digging the flow of the trail! After riding we went to the cabin and then on to the local inn for sum grub. Brett rolled in around 10:30 as Ross & I were making last minute race prep. The one last minute change I made per Ross’s story of last year’s race was cutting back on the thickness of the two hour bottle of Hammer stuff. It made perfect sense per my past experience (not being able to digest Hammer stuff during lasts year 90 degree 160 mile ride across Indiana), race day was supposed to be in the 80’s so I thought that strategy would prevent any nutrition disaster.
5:15am strolled around mighty fast - get up, eat and go. Ross and I rode to the venue to warm up a bit. The race started down the road from the single track at 7:00am. 240+/- racers jocking for position. I got in the top 20 and was witness to the most spastic riding I’ve ever seen my super smooth calm teammate race. The start was straight up a small but mighty hill. What made it so mighty were the troughs of sand leading up to the climb and the heaps of sand on the bottom, steepest part of the hill. We entered double file and then someone fell. This threw Ross into the deepest of the sand and he was all over the place, pinging and knocking off riders trying to maintain some kind of momentum. Then he jumped off and back on only to hear his drive train scream with pain and pop and Ross was off swarming into yet another uncontrollable sand pit and nearly taking out another handful of riders. I held up a bit and he jumped in and then we hit the base of the climb. I guess not one rider made the lower portion of the climb, all dismounted and ran up the wall of sand according to Tif. Ross and I made it to the single track in the top 15ish. As far as I could see we were all pacing along the single track. I was tucked in behind Ross and Ernesto and they were behind a few other riders. I was content and just eased into the pace, but then spastic boy wasn’t finished, we where on a downhill and he decided to pass Ernie on a crazy section, Ross steps it up, pushes down on the cranks and swerves left into the high ferns & grass, sticks popping and flying Ross has nowhere to go as Ernie was on the rear tire of the guy in front of him, they slam elbows a bit, I’m thinking what the F you doing Ross. I thought for sure Ernie was going to hold his line but I guess he figured safe then sorry and finally let Ross in. We continued tempo for ¾ a lap then on the open field climb the pack split. I backed off a bit, content with the start and my position I decided to race my race and see what happens.

After watching spastic boy, the rest of the race was status quo and every bit as normal as a 100 miler could be. It only had 8000 feet or so of climbing but that was very deceiving because the course layout was rather flat. You were constantly working and hammering the flats, pedaling most of the time, trying to not ping off any trees at high speed, there was never any real recovery. The only issues I had was sever lower back pain on lap 2 and 3. I figured it was due to the tight hamstrings but more then likely it was the pounding speed of the course and my week core strength. My hands also blistered up good, but that’s what I get for not riding much single track this year and conditioning my hands to 100 miles of singletrack. I did hit the same tree twice, so hard the first time I really thought I had broken my carbon handlebars, but all was good!

I dig the format of this race, it’s not a 100 mile single loop but 4 - 25 mile laps. Its nice having access to my awesome pit crew - my lovely, smiling and encouraging wife each lap. She finds ways to inspire me to finish faster – like... “hurry up, the bugs are eat’n me alive” so the sooner I could finish… her suffering would end with mine! Also I like not having to rely on aid stations for 100 milers, you just never know if your stuff is gonna be there? I took enough Hammer Nutrition and water to get me through each lap and that strategy worked to perfection for this race. I really did not feel any super lows, or have any nasty stomach issues associated with heat and fatigue. It was also great to be able to gauge your lap times to see how the suffering was relating to previous laps.

Split times
18th place #37 Kevin Daum 1:46 3:47 5:55 8:07

Lap times
1:46 lap 1
2:01 lap 2
2:08 lap 3
2:12 lap 4I tried to stay consistent with my lap times. I was shooting for a under 8 hour finish, once again missed it by a couple of minutes but considering I’ve been off the bike 4 of the past 6 weeks with pulled hamstrings I’m glad I reached my goal of a top 20 finish. Shoot, the rest and recovery probably helped more the hurt! I’ve been trying to figure out ways to get faster and break the top 15 or maybe even the top 10. But when I analyze the results and rider profiles I should be sit back, grab a beer and be happy for what I got. Do I want to sacrifice any more then I already have for the sake of a few more positions - F YA! Sure I could lose 10 more pounds but then I’d be skinny rib cage meth dude. Can’t do anything about cutting down my 6’4” size. I can train and ride more but I'd be stuck with the guilt of leaving my son Landon and wife Connie and wondering if they'll pack up and leave one day. All the cycling magazines are reporting about the abuse of drugs in our sport, maybe that’s the way to get faster, all the cool kids are doing it! I could quit my full time job and have time for training, riding, family, fatherhood, but I don’t think the $500 first place prizes for some of these events could be close to supporting your trip costs plus entry fees let alone costs of living and raising a family.

It is what it is and I’ll take it.

Lumberjack 100

2007-06-18T08:55:00.000-05:00

Quick update.

Race went as well as one of these can go for me. I finished 19th overall out of 250 racers in a time of 8.07. The Ohio contingent faired well. Shawn Adams – 5th, Ernie M – 10th, Ross Clark 12th, yours truly 19th, Brett Davis 30th.

The top 10 were mainly pro and semi-pro riders. Not sure how I can crack into that kind of finish seeing I’m over a foot taller and 30lbs heavier but my pursuit will continue. I’m satisfied with my finish. It was a good fast fun course and all was well. More details soon!

LumberJack 100

2007-06-14T13:22:00.000-05:00

Off to race # 3 of the National Ultra Endurance MTB Series this weekend. Taking this one for what it is, a see whats up and where I stand race, the hamstrings seem fully recovered so we'll see what I got and if I can dish it out. Looks like its been as dry up in Mich as here in Ohio, so should be a fast dry course in 80 degree weather. Ross and Brett have also registered. The course is a little different from other courses, four 25 mile laps with 99% single track and about 1/2 the climbing of the other races in the series.

The race website can be found here Lumberjack100

Sitting one out

2007-06-04T20:41:00.000-05:00

I knew this was going to be a rough week. Connie finally pushed me out the door and on my bike this weekend. She knew it was time based on my level of non-riding grumpiness and my limping and gimping around the house had deminished. This weekend was the Mohican 100 (stop number 2 for the National Ultra Endurance Mountain Bike Series) I should stay away from reading all the blogs about the race - it makes me even more bummed I decided not to race. I’m still trying to convince myself it was the right decision. So what’s up with sir lazziness?

First off….did not realize how long it’s been since my last post. No racing action to report. Been prepping for the Mohican 100 which was this past weekend, including quite a few visits to the Mohican trail system and was feeling really good about it, but all my prep was for not.

Since the Cohutta 100

Week #17 – 8 hours training (recovery week)
Week #18 - 12 hours training - starting riding down at Mohican
Week #19 - 18 hours training - rode Mohican Forest both ways – 50 miles total. Have the 25 miles of single-track wired, feeling ready for the Mohican 100.
Week # 20 - 2 hours of training - this was supposed to be my 20+ hour week. Pulled/strained both hamstrings working in the yard, did not know it happened until the next morning. Way strange. I’m guessing they were super tight (as usual) and jamming the shovel into mother earth ripped/stained em good. It was tough to stand up and walk the first couple of days. Tried to ride the bike on Friday, did ok for 1st ½ hour but then after 10 minute tempo hamstrings said no way.
Week # 21 - 2 hours of training - Allergies came out of nowhere this year and have been a huge drag, have zero energy and want to sleep, a cup of coffee seems heavy to lift. Fatigue level is strange – best to describe it as Flu like systems with out the nasty of the flu. Combined with the strained hamstrings, I’m bumming but getting stuff done around the house.
Week # 22 - 8 hours of training - rode Tuesday with Connie at Reagan Park. Connie kept me in check, hamstrings felt good. Still unable to stretch them without any great deal of pain. Wednesday hit the trainer and increased intensity and was able to get 1 ½ hour.
Week #23 – We’ll see what happens. I’m gaining my flexibility back. Hamstrings are still tight but does not hurt to ride anymore. Rode to work this morning. Medina to Akron is about 23 miles one way. Takes about 1 ½ hours. So that gives me 50 miles and 3 hours in the saddle each day and saves me about 10 bucks in gas in day.

The good news – time off the bike equals muscle recovery and a lot of free time - been able to finish up a lot of stuff around the house that training hampers. Got the new kitchen floor totally finished, new windows installed, raised garden put in and 10 yards of mulch and 4 ½ tons of stone thrown around with the help of friends and family.

Next stop, the Lumberjack 100 in upper Michigan in two weeks.

Cohutta 100

2007-04-24T12:54:00.000-05:00

More photos can be viewed here

My Bad - its tough to read with the photos, I'll try something different next time!

Off to the Tour de Georgia

All bets where on Wednesday night! Will all the gear for 3 adults, a 2 year old and the supplies for a 100 mile race fit in the new Jeep? Connie was giving me the crossed arms attitude “NO way your getting all the stuff in the Jeep”. Game on! I don’t play to lose, so I packed super light and took no extra bike parts, just an extra bike to strip parts from if needed. ½ hour later I was plugg’n the geo codes in the GPS and the Jeep was on the way. No maps, just relying on good ole technology for the first time. Thursday morning we arrived on the top of Lookout Mountain near Chattanooga Tenn. for stage 5 of the Tour de Georgia. For those of ya that don’t know, this is one of America’s premier professional road races. Teams from Spain, Belgium and wherever in Europe come over to battle the 7 day, 600+ mile stage race. The 18 mile time trail ended on the top of the mountain. It was cool to see the pros go at it and have all access to them. Afterwards we hung out around the Team Discovery Vehicles. Landon scored big when he saw the van filled with after race recovery food and decided to join the team. He did not hesitate to go up and ask the riders for a banana but they did not understand what he wanted so they gave him a water bottle. He shook his head & told them NO, and pointed to the Bananas. They quickly got the hint and promptly grabbed a banana and Landon jumped up with joy, everyone watching applauded and clapped. Afterwards Levi, George, Tom and the team signed the water bottle they just gave Landon.

Soon after we started to head back to the car and Landon began screaming “BITE, BITE, BITE and grabbing at his knee. I was carrying him and glanced down, I was covered with nearly 100 red ants…they were scaling and climbing up my lower body, getting ready to battle the big bad giant that mistakenly stepped on their nest. Then the attack began…sting after sting, after f-ing bite. Connie was freaking about getting Landon stripped down, I was swatting, jumping, swerving and dancing knocking the little battle drones down one by one. Craig jumped in and started flicking the little bastards off. Once I had my shirt off we thought we’d won the battle. No more ants could be seen, just the fresh battle wounds. Then I was hit by the last of the Mohicans…must have been the leader of the special forces of the red army…he infiltrated my shorts and took a couple bites in my crotch! M-F’r! Nothing like grabbing yourself in public with everyone looking and laughing their ass off…very funny! HA! After the battle of Lookout Mountain we packed up and headed to our Cabin on the border of Tenn and GA in McCaysville. That night, after the kids went to bed Bruce showed up with 2 growlers from a local Ashville brewery, Craig had the SoCo and we drowned ourselves in the hot tub.
Friday we headed off to Stage 6, the famous Brass Town Bald hill climb, the end of a 104 mile race day capped off with a visit to the wall, a 5 mile climb to the finish. It was cool stage to watch in person! On the walk up the final mile to the top, Landon was given a piece of caulk by one of the spectators and he wrote on every piece of lettering & artwork as we assaulted the hill. Everyone was laughing and cheering as Landon left his mark on Brass Town Bald!

So…..we were forced to park at the bottom of the mountain and take the shuttle up, but after the race was over the shuttle line was super long, so we put the 2 kids in the Burley stroller and headed down, down, down. 5 miles. Ross, Jason, Craig and I each took turns ripping and tearing up our race ready legs. The decent was brutal trying to hold the stroller from freefalling down the hill. The front brake was useless due to the angle of the slope. Perfect pre-race conditioning…absolutely not! We limped back to the cars and headed over to the Cohutta 100 race registration which was at the site of the 1996 Olympic White Water Center! A beautiful location nessled in the valley near Ducktown, TN. We deposited our drop bags and went back to the cabin.

Cohutta 100

Results are up for the Cohutta
check em out.
Cycling News Article about the Cohutta
check it out

The alarm went off at 5:00am and we packed up and shipped out the race start. It was 40degrees. Ross and I lined up next to former Olympian; Tinker Juarez, down the line was the World 24 hour solo Champion Chris Eatough, last years series endurance series champion; Harlan Price and other notable endurance racers such as Mark Hendershot and Ernesto Marenchin. The race started with a 3 mile climb up the highway; I watched as the top riders jockeyed for positioned right before the single track. We went from 5 wide to 2 wide on the double track downhill. Then a small bottle neck as we entered the single track. I had no idea where Ross was until he upped next to me and said go ahead. I was behind another Ohioan Ernesto. We were cruising the single track at a decent pace for 7 miles, then my first issue of the day struck. I say issues because I’m not throwing out excuses. A big ole 1 inch stick of Tennessee lumber snapped up and lodged in my derailleur. I stopped and pulled the dang thing out, did not even look to see if there was any damage, I was more concerned about getting behind slower riders, we had another couple miles of tight trail to go. I caught back up to Ross and we entered more single track. When we hit the first hill I backed the gears down a bit and they started skipping, jumping, popping and cracking. F-me! 10 mile into a 100 mile race and I lose my 4 climbing gears, it was either the last cog (slow) or 4 up (hard). I could not get it to engage in any of the comfy climbing gears. Whatcha gonna do? The extra derailleur hangers where in my gear bag in the Jeep. As we dumped onto the 70 miles of fire road I was getting passed by three riders on each hill. I was climbing in the slow gear, saving my legs for later was my think’n. I tried not to get pissed off. Then Garth pulled up we started chating, and commenting on how Ross does it, he’s up front, lives in shit for weather N.E. Ohio and has two small kids! “He’s on fire!” We caught several riders and paced together until we hit some more climbing. I could not keep with my gear selection so I backed off. I was alone. The first 40 miles were rough; I was

feeling below average and just had absolutely no funk. A small part was frustration, but a majority of me wasn't feel'n it. I was simply not in the groove. Somewhere along the trail a single speeder caught me and we paced for 10-15 miles together. It passed the time! I lost him at the next aid station when I left before he did. But something leading up to the aid station perked me up. The mojo dropped from the heavens through the canopy of trees and the strength crept back into my legs. It must have been the 10 mile blazing down hill. I was on a flat section and I began picking racers off. I attacked hill after hill and soaked up the clean air and sweet views. When I hit the last aid station I looked at my watch at thought, dang…I was aiming for a sub nine hour finish time but I was more inline with a sub 8. That gave me some renewed inspiration. With the hurt gone I pushed on. I saw Jason, Bruce, Connie, Landon & Craig with only 10 miles to go, sittn on the side of the road cheering me on! (I hope they know how much that little bit of cheering helps!) The last 10 miles was some sweet single track. I dumped out on the road with 1 minute left til 8 hours…I got it! Until I realized where I was! A mile or so down from the finish line…I hammered on and saw 8 hours hit my watch…if I only would have known I would have not stopped at every aid station, I even grabbed two handfuls of Jelly Belly’s at aid station 3. (new favorite race food, guess the flavor as you ride up a long hill) Oh well…lesson learned…never hold back! I crossed the finish line at 8:03:04 in 27th place. My teammate Ross finished 40 minutes ahead of me for 8th place (great job). The Ohio boys did well. Shawn Adams finished 5th, Ross 8th, Ernesto 16th, Garth 20th any yours truly 27th. It was all good!

35 Mile Race
Shortly after our race started, a cross country race went off. The typical 35 mile suffer fest. Once again Ohio looked strong. Good old fast boy Gary Snodgrass took first place, Bruce took 5th place and Jason hung in there for 20ish..not bad considering Jason has not moved up to the expert class yet, but this shows he’s on the way.

All in all it was a very cool trip and race. Unfortunately, according to my wife Connie, it will be my last. On Friday’s hike up Brass Town Bald, Connie decided to sacrifice herself and was carrying Landon up the final mile. She was letting me rest for race day, (God I love this woman) but then she let me and hundreds of spectators sitting on the climb know it. “I carried Landon for 9 months and now I’m carrying him up the largest mountain in GA! This SUCKS! We’re never going on a vacation like this again!” She YELLED! I tried to do the right thing and hold back my laughter, but I was scared, I thought she was going to hyperventilate, her heart was pounding out her chest and she was sweeting & shaking!

So…. what’s my next move? 1) annulment 2) hang the bikes up 3) stick it out – she still loves me-right? Anyone have any good advice, need a little help here!

Needless to say…on the way home Connie admitted she has a new respect for cycling. How do you ride up that when we can’t even walk it! She has a new view on the pain and suffering she witnessed on the Wall!

Here’s a few other blogs of the Cohutta 100 if your interested.

http://www.sologoat.blogspot.com/

http://www.jeffkerkove.net/

http://www.stevekinley.blogspot.com/

http://chrisploch.blogspot.com/

http://www.eddieodea.com/

http://andysanidas.blogspot.com/

http://partridgeracing.blogspot.com/

Specialized Roubaix S-Works Review

2007-04-24T12:50:00.000-05:00

Check out this review of my new road bike. One of these days I'll find some time to write something up - but for now this pretty much sums it up!

http://www.cyclingnews.com/tech.php?id=tech/2007/reviews/specialized_roubaixsl07

100 Miler on the horizon

2007-04-05T12:14:00.000-05:00

The first race of the NUE Ultra Endurance Mountain Bike national series takes place in a couple weeks in Tennessee – April 21st to be exact. Looking forward to this one…Gary’s been talking up the area and the trails big time - (He just broke ground on his new house which is very close to these trails). My teammate Ross also entered this race so we’re making a mini family vacation of the weekend and taking the 2 yr olds Landon and Emily. Check out this cabin the Clark’s found…complete with Jacuzzi! We’re also going to check out the Pro road racers at stage 5 of the Tour of Georgia on Friday and the famous Brasstown Bald hill climb! We’ll be slamming the cowbells and soaking up the atmosphere! Just sent my entry in for the Big MF'er aka Lumberjack 100 in Michigan on June 16, the spaces are filling up fast! Here’s the profile and map of the 100 mile Cahutta race. Time to start prepping!

Cohutta 100 profile

Taking advantage of being sick.

2007-04-05T10:16:00.000-05:00

Been off the bike the last week or so. Maybe pushing 4 hours or so of total training time. Kinda pulling back on the training reins a bit. The getting up at 5:00am to hit the trainer and then not going to sleep til late…many days after midnight was starting to catch up with me. I’ve been feel’n decent on the bike so I did not feel bad about cutting back the training volume and knew the dark circles surrounding my eyes was a sign to rest a bit. Then a couple days ago I got the intestinal bug Connie just got over! But finding good out of bad situations is what’s its all about…right! …WEIGHT LOSS! I’m now a few pounds lighter then I was before I was sick! That’s less poundage I'll have to carry up the mountain climbs and with the Cohutta 100 fast approaching the timing is good…I think? I’ll aim to keep the weight off once I squash this bug but that never happens.…I got issues!

It's Justified!

2007-04-05T09:43:00.000-05:00

When we arrived in Florida, Connie’s uncle shows us this sweat ass new jacked up on roids truck he just bought. My teammate Mr. Rodgers goes out and buys this sweet fully loaded vette. My Parents go out and buy two new great looking vehicles. My wife Connie has her new ride as of last year. Needless to say…I was getting some serious new car envy as I drove my 2001 Chevy Venture LT extended mini van around town. Maybe call it an image crisis, I don’t know but I wasn’t feeling too good about myself. I’ve been a tad frugal over the years, trying to stay out of trouble and out of debt, throwing money into the 401K and Roth IRA’s like they were going to ban them the next year….I was trying to be smart…you know…the compounding value of saving for the future. Well, I decided it was time to pull back and reward myself. Ya…that’s it…no soccer mom image crisis, envy or whatever… a reward…that’s it. ITS JUSTIFIED! I have never owned a new car…always went for the great deal on a used car. Never thought I’d feel good about driving a new car off the lot and taking the depreciation hit…until I took the top off my new Jeep and drove around in the 80 degree sunshine we had a few days ago. I found my new ride and feel good about it. The mini-van is history! I now introduce da Daum's newest ride...2007 Jeep Wranger Unlimited Sahara 4x4

“Today was a good day” – 125 miles in the saddle

2007-03-26T13:15:00.000-05:00

After race cool down.

I drove down to the race with my teammate Dustin. As anyone with kids knows…if you have the opportunity to ride…seize it. Connie was at a conference and Landon was at her parent’s house. So I was kinda planning on riding back to Medina pending the weather and how I felt after the race. After waiting around a bit for the cat 1-3 class to finish, I looked at the skies and decided it was not going to rain on my parade today, so I stocked up on the hammer stuff and water and began the 78 mile ride back to Medina. The one thing I didn’t think about until Dustin was long gone, was daylight hours. I don’t think I left Mid Ohio til 3:15-3:30ish. I don’t remember, but I knew sundown was at 7:45 so that gave me 4 hours to get home safely. Doing the math meant holding a 20mph pace. I turned up the mp3 player to block out the hum of the wind and entered into my 4 hour tempo workout. The bike responded and I worked on a lot of things. Mainly my new pedal stroke. I was amazed at how well everything was flowing. When I felt weakness in the legs it was because I was reverting back to my old pedal stroke. A mental note to adjust my stoke and the pain was gone, speed and tempo increased and all was good! The wind was coming out of the west at a pretty steady rate, the forecast said 14mph and I’d have to agree. The ride north was the most grueling part, constant wind beating the right side of my body, with guest giving me a good battle every now and then. It got cloudy dark several times but only drizzled. Once I turned and headed east, it was Nirvana (An ideal condition of rest, harmony, stability and joy) The wind at my back up’d my speed to 25mph for a good 1 hour. Then the sun came out and brought a renewed warmth and bliss that took me once again to a very happy place. As the sun was setting, I was entering Chatham and did not think I would make it. I stopped and called Connie to tell her my progress and she might have to pick me up, but she was still at her Parents. It was up to me to get home. I pulled in my driveway at 7:45. Total ride time of 4 hours. I spent 13 minutes looking at maps, eating, mixing my drink, and trying to get cell phone reception.

All in All it made for a 125 mile day. 6 miles warming up for race, 40 mile race, 78 miles home. It was the first time I average 20mph by myself on a ride day over 100 miles. Ice Cube’s song kept creeping into my heading….”Today was a good day!”

Mid Ohio Tour (road race #1)

2007-03-26T13:06:00.000-05:00

The race to 3RD place.

Saturday was my first road race of the season at Mid Ohio Sports Car Course, newly repaved I might add. You never know what Mother Nature is going to dish out this early in the season and Saturday was no different. It rained all morning as a band of thunderstorms crashed through Ohio. It was grey skies and wet conditions come race start time around 1:00 but after the first couple minutes of water in your face you forgot about it. I think there were 30-40 guys in the cat 3-4 class. Steve and I were the only ones from the Solon squad in this division. Dustin entered his first road race in the cat 4-5 class. Steve and I were looking around and deciding who we were going to chase down & mark but as the race unfolded we ended up alternating chasing breaks. After a couple of laps Steve looked at me and said “dude - we can’t continue this for 25 laps” and he was right. We had to rely on the other teams to do a little work and hope a break did not form without one of us in it. To make a long story short, Steve and I ended up doing our fair share of the work upfront chasing down and jumping in the breaks, but that was also shared with Stark Velo, Team Echelon and a few other guys. Nobody got away.

I’ll spare ya the lap by lap details. As we entered the last couple of laps, I was not sure how my legs would respond to last weeks training efforts in NC- climbing Mt. Mitchell and riding Pisqah. But I was looking for a good workout and I got it. The last couple laps came and went, Steve & I stayed up front and tried to rest a bit. On the last lap I inched towards the front after the s-turn and waited to see who my dancing partners were going to be. Then on the hill before the last turn into the straight away the attack began. I thought this might be a bit early, but I didn’t want to let this one slip away and jumped in. I was third as we entered the headwind on the straight away to the finish line. Then someone in front of me totally sat up, spent their legs, I went to go around them but whoever was behind me blocked me in and I touched the breaks to avoid the rider and waited for him to get to the side, I then stomped down and caught the guy that passed me and got in his slipstream, then he completely sat up. I could not believe it. This was the most inefficient sprint effort I have ever done. I sure know how to pick em! So after losing momentum for the second time and the finish line somewhere in front of me I stood up and hammered down one last time and did what I could. I had the energy when I crossed the finish line but I feel I let this one slip away from lack of experience in road racing. That's the way it goes - but it was fun non-the-less. I ended up in Third place. Steve took 8th place. This was only the second time on my new road bike – Specialized SW Roubaix. It took me a few laps to adjust to the cockpit, but then she fit like a glove and everything melted together for the perfect blend. The tires hooked up on the wet course and the bike responded to everything I threw at it.

Stark Velo rider Scott Thor has another review of the race here.

Weekender to North Carolina

2007-03-19T12:45:00.000-05:00

For the last two years I've been trying to hook up with the March team training ride to Asheville, NC, but a few minor things always seem to get crop up, like my son Landon being born. The stories always seem epic and the riding is so good one of my teammates moved there 2 years ago. This year Connie & I made it a must and took friday off and made the 9 hour drive, met up at Bruce's house and settled into the weekend of riding bliss.

Saturday - Pisgah

Picture of tunnel trail at Bent Creek, part of Pisgah National Forest. This is where we started our ride saturday morning. Then we rode our bikes over to Pisgah and hit some monster climbs and ass flos'n decents.
I was going to write up more about Pisgah, truely an unbelievable place to ride, but Bob already has that covered with a sweat review of that day...check it out here on our team website.
On a side note, 1/2 way on the drive down to NC, Connie asks me if I packed her shoes and helmet? She ended up with Bob's size 10's with 3 pairs of socks and newspapers stuffed in the toes. We adjusted the cleats all the way back, Bruce lent her an extra "orange" helmet and she was good to go!

Sunday - Tres Amigos 18 Degree assault of Mount Mitchell

Sunday we woke up before sunrise to climb Mount Mitchell. This mountain rises more than a mile high and is surrounded by the gentle mist of low-hanging clouds. Mount Mitchell is the Highest Mountain in eastern America and soars 6,684 feet into the cold misty haze. The game plan, get everyone packed and into the vehicles and meet Ken and Ray at the Folk Art Center at sunrise. Oh ya...last night was Saint Patty's day. Fat chance in hell - impossible, but Dang we were close, only a half hour off with all the gear we had to load, for we where heading home as soon as we uncliped from the pedals. We all knew Ken & Ray would be on the bikes when we got there, so it actually gave for a quick start pace and chase down. Toss a carrot as strong as Ken and Ray in front of these hungry rabbits and its game on!

As we were climbing, I realized Mount Mitchell State Park is an extraordinary place. For a moment I forgot how flipping cold I was - when I looked out over the horizon I got a feast for my eyes—breathtaking views of the Blue Ridge Mountains, rolling ridges and lush valleys. Another tranquil moment to add to the slideshow in my mind. The peaks where glazed with ice and rocky cliffs sparkled with icicles which then snapped and exploded, crashing to the road as we ascended. I'd go in and out of my happy place as the ice brought me back into reality. Ross, Todd and I were the only one's stupid enough to ascend to the top. When I checked the meters at the weather station up top it was 18 degrees. We grabbed a quick bite to eat, soaked up the scenery and made the mental preperations for the decent. We easily hit 30+ miles per hour on the way down, the wind chill had to be way below zero. We all stopped after the first 4 miles, jumped off our bikes and started running and dancing around, trying to get the feeling back in our burning fingers and toes. We could not talk, only make tribal sounds as our faces were numb and frozen. After a few minutes of this we finally could strike up a conversation and we decided to slow down a bit and stay in the sun when possible. As we made the hours long journey back it warmed up a few degrees. I forgot to mention, our entire route was gated off, it was nice having 30+ miles of road all to yourselves. I have not yanked the stats off my computer yet, but I'm hearing it was a round trip of 60 miles give or take. Sign me up for next year, there is so much more down there to explore!

Last week

2007-03-19T12:04:00.000-05:00

Got in a great group ride last sunday. Gary, Brett, Brian, Jeff, Ross, Dustin, Mike & Steve. Alot of good conversation and catching up. Dispite the reputation of everyone, this was no hammerfest. The ride was kept in check for whatever reason. Auggie tried to suck eveyone in a couple of times, but he must have submitted to the group. I ended up with slightly more then 5 hours. The forecasters lied again...it never got above 35 degrees. Oh ya...watch out for black ice and cars. We had a scarry close call when one of us lost it on the ice and almost went under a car!

Tuesday saw a spike in the weather for 2 days. It hit near 70 degrees and it was actually sunny. Connie & I meet up after work at the bike and hike and took Landon for his first ride of the year - a 1 hour spin in the burley. Only possible due to the new day light savings thing - Thank you! We managed to dodge the melting snow and ice, the trail was was 90% dry...spring has got to be on the way. Back to reality- cold, wet and grey skies. We're hovering at that 30 degrees point that creates a rain snow slop mix and alot of unhappy cyclists.

More Razorback

2007-03-19T11:49:00.000-05:00

A few more photos just surfaced from the Razorback race.

The start of the race - the run to the bikes -
seemed like a mile, but I think it was only a 1/4 to 1/2 mile

Enjoying the Flow

Florida Trip - Recap

2007-02-21T15:33:00.000-05:00

Day 3 - The Family Reunion

So what called us to Florida in the middle of the coldest Ohio winter I can ever remember - the Brown Family Reunion. I can finally put a face to all the names Connie kept tossing out. This is Connie's Mom's Sister's Husband's side of the Family. I must say, what a cool family. I had a great time. It was a also a time of firsts...Landon & I went on a horse ride, my first. We rode a 4 wheeler which I believe was my first, Connie and I won the egg toss (see the video). And holy shit...did I eat. Uncle Mike is a master griller and smoker! The hard effort in preparing the food was appreciated by all. Smoked pulled pork, smoked beans (my favorite), orange poppy seed marinated shrimp wrapped in Bacon and yep...grilled to smokin perfection, the steak was mighty tasty also. I shit you not...I gained some good poundage because I weighed in 5 pounds more, after the race... when I got home - I could not say no to all that food. It was also alot of fun to watch all the kids, Aunt Shirley hooked em up with a fun outdoor experience and a ton of toys to play with. It seemed as if eveyone that came had little ones attached, Landon was running around and having a hoot and playing with everyone!

Day 4 - Razorback Pre-ride
Razorback was an hour away from Deland and only open on the weekends, so I took off Sunday afternoon after everyone left the family reunion and meet Ken and Ray in Reddick Florida. whhhoooo neelly...I did not expect this kind of trail in Florida. I love this stuff, tight, technical, short climbs, twisty, curvy high speed big ring sections and rocks! It took me a lap to find a touch of rhytmn with a new bike and such a long time away from the single track. We did 3 laps before the place closed...I found my happy place...riding excellent single track in February in shorts when its negative 20 degrees in back in Ohio...yep...I was indeed in a happy place!

Day 5-6 - BodyWorks, Disney and Family
Went for an easy recovery ride in the am then it was off to the BodyWorks Exhibit in Orlando. We missed the exhibit when it was in Cleveland. This was actually a very cool thing to see and I learned alot. Connie was absolutely amazed and showed me everything she could. You would think this to be a "gross" exhibit but it was the opposite, once inside you found yourself examining the bodies and you were able to see what only doctors have been priveldged. Connie explained and showed me the muscle groups that had been bothering me, and other injuries that her athletes had encountered.

After the exhibit we headed south to Sebring and visited my Grandparents. Landon helped grandpa pick some fresh grapefruit and oranges and we had a good time relaxing and spending time with them. The next morning it was off to Disney World. Landon had a blast. We basically walked onto every ride and experienced the whole park. Capped it off with the fireworks and then back to Deland. I woke up the next morning at 5:00am and drove off to Ocala to meet Ken and Ray at Santos. Holy shit...another unbelievable place to ride. We rode around until we hit the quarry and the Red Bull Rampage stuff...crazy 20 foot drops and jumps. Then we went off to the landbridge. An actual trail over I-75, one of Florida busiest highways. I can't not believe they allocated money for this, it connected two major sections of trail. You could ride here for days and never ride the same trail. The other amazing thing was a sign I saw...It said something about Horses not allowed on the trail and they would be fined if caught! Its the opposite in Ohio! Just the other week one of my riding buds got caught, fined and bike impounded for riding in our national trails where horses are allowed but not bikes...wtf! Anyway, after this I headed back to Deland, dropped Connie and Landon off at the Airport and went to Ken's to rest up for the race. He had a great meal prepared the night before the race. Meet Brett and Ernesto and we prerode the course on Friday and then Saturday was the race...see below.

Florida Trip - Day 1 & 2

2007-02-19T09:23:00.000-05:00

The Tornado

Arrived in Deland Florida on Thursday night and stayed at Connie's aunt and uncles house, unknown to us as we drove in the dark, the tornado that ripped through Lady Lake Florida also made a pass 8 houses from where Connie's aunt and uncle live, and they slept through the freak'n thing! My bike arrived Friday morning (more on that later) and I took a spin around the local roads Saturday morning, hoping to find some trail to ride but I did not realize the damage that had devasted the area. It damn near made me sick to my stomach to witness the damage firsthand. I rode past FEMA disaster assistance tents and through security checkpoints, chatting with several police officers along the way, they where trying to prevent looting and giving those a chance to clean up. The debre was endlessly stacked up next to the road waiting for trucks to hull it away to the dump. I saw a trampoline and pieces of roofs hanging from the tops of trees. It was unbelievable, I eventually turned around, my eyes could only take so much.

12 Hours of Razorback - 6hr version

2007-02-17T22:04:00.000-05:00

USA Cycling National Ultra Endurance Race #1

A review of the Razorback race in Reddick, Florida.

Held off the pressure to do the 12 hour race and opted for the 6 hour version, seeing this was my first race in 18 months and the fact I had to fly home at 8:00am the next day made this an easy decision. The race started 1/2 hour late due to a ton of late arrivals, we all lined up for the longest f-ing run I've ever done in cycling shoes...1/2 - 3/4 mile or more? I must have had a flashing yellow sign posted on me that exclaimed "Please fall right in front of me" Before we even hit the single track I had two racers fall and then a huge pile up as we entered the single track... it was near 10 racers falling over the simplest and goofiest shit and parking their ass in the middle of the trail during the race. I was feeling good, despite the expected continuous lower back pain and hand numbness of the first mtbr race of the season. Only had one small incident, I took an inside line on a banked turn to pass a slower rider, in doing so, my left vest sleeve caught a trimmed tree branch and tried to rip me from my bike, but I remained clipped in the pedals and instead swung my ass around the tree trunk, hanging from my vest in the air. Looking back at it, it was funny, but dang that branch ripped into my arm. Lesson learned when building new trail...cut all branches to the trunk! Anyway... on the 5th lap I think I was holding 7th or 8th place when I noticed super low air pressure in my rear wheel. Luckily I was within a mile of our campsite/pitrow so I rode the flat back. Can't figure out what happen, must have knocked the bead out of the tubeless and burbed a ton of air? ...threw a tube in and went on my way. I ended up finishing 10th out of 76 solo 6 hour racers. I missed the cut off (5 1/2 hrs) for the 7th lap by 7 minutes and I was 3:62 out of 7th place and 1:66 out of 9th place...so the flat tire may have cost me a few spots... but that's racing.

Brett and Ernesto were 10 and 7 minutes in front of me, they were running 6th & 7th place in the 12 hour race as of 6:00pm with 4 hours to go. Ernesto had double flatted. Harlan Price, the 2006 US MTB100 Ultra series winner was camped next to us was running in 2nd place. In the end, Harlan won the 12 hour, Brett got 5th place and Ernesto got 7th place.

Despite being bummed about the flat tire, I went into the race to gauge my fitness. I was shooting for a top ten finish and I just made it. In analyzing the results of the 12 hour race at the 6 lap mark, I would have been in 8th place in the 12 hour race, 7 minutes back from 7th place, and 14 minutes in front of 9th place...but that's easier said then done, I don't think my body could have taken the pounding the course was dishing out for another 6 hours. So all is well, it felt great to be back in the saddle and racing again after such a long time off. Raced my new Specialized S-Works hardtail bike...it was FLAWLESS!

Lap times can be viewed here 6 hours of Razorback

My lastest creation...the 5:00am spin

2007-02-06T13:56:00.000-05:00

I've strung together a couple workouts from my CTS days back on '04. Probably goes against the whole slow-twitch, fast-twitch muscle group workout theory...but its all below Lactate Theshold and contained within cadence and heartrate ranges for each interval and damn it...it feels good at 5:00am in the morning. Been increasing the intensity a bit for the Razorback race in Florida on the 18th of February and somehow melted my tuesday/thurday morning workouts into this.

Drink 1 large cup of coffee
WarmUp 10:00
Tempo 03:00
SteadyState 01:00
PowerInterval 00:30
Recovery 02:00
Tempo 10:00
Recovery 02:00
Tempo 10:00
Drink more Coffee
Recovery 02:00
SteadyState 04:00
Recovery 02:00
SteadyState 04:00
Recovery 02:00
SteadyState 04:00
Recovery 02:00
Fast Pedals 02:00
Recovery 02:00
Fast Pedals 02:00
Recovery 02:00
(raise front tire a couple inches)
Climbing Repeats 10:00
Recovery 08:00
Climbing Repeats 10:00
Recovery 08:00
Climbing Repeats 10:00
CoolDown 10:00
Total Time 2:02:30

Drink more coffee!

Arctic Weather

2007-02-04T21:23:00.000-05:00

All I can say is arctic...The indoor trainer rides usually get redundant by this time, but not this year. I've been tweak'n the new rides and getting used to the new frame size so I'm a kid in the candy store each time I get on board the new rigs. Leave for Florida in 4 days and taking the new Specialized S-Works hardtail...can't freak'n wait to hit some unfrozen singletrack!

Tonight: A chance of snow showers. Mostly cloudy, with a low around -2. Wind chill values between -16 and -21. West wind around 16 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%. Total nighttime snow accumulation of less than one inch possible.

Monday: A chance of snow showers. Partly cloudy and cold, with a high near 7. Wind chill values between -13 and -22. West wind between 15 and 18 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.

...WIND CHILL ADVISORY NOW IN EFFECT UNTIL 1 PM EST TUESDAY...

THE WIND CHILL ADVISORY IS NOW IN EFFECT UNTIL 1 PM EST TUESDAY.

ARCTIC AIR IN PLACE ACROSS THE REGION WILL COMBINE WITH GUSTY
WINDS TO PRODUCE DANGEROUSLY LOW WIND CHILL VALUES TONIGHT THROUGH
MID DAY TUESDAY.

WIND CHILL VALUES WILL RANGE FROM 10 TO 20 DEGREES BELOW ZERO
THROUGH THE PERIOD.

IF YOU WILL BE OUTDOORS USE COMMON SENSE AND DRESS WARMLY...
MAKING SURE THAT ALL EXPOSED SKIN IS COVERED. IF POSSIBLE...AVOID
PROLONGED EXPOSURE TO THE COLD TO PREVENT FROSTBITE AND
HYPOTHERMIA.

Where have I been?

2007-01-23T22:01:00.000-05:00

Took a season off, I mean way off...the bike that is. A huge vacation from cycling is what I'm calling it. 2006 was tough, but let me spend valuable time home with my new family, adjust to fatherhood, and take a break from overtraining! I think I finally drove my wife nuts and she forced me back on the bike to regain "our" sanity...She knows what makes me happy. I did do one long ass interesting ride in 2006. The RAIN ride...Ride Across Indiana...160 miles in 90 degrees heat...heres an except from that experience -

I knew i was pushing my limits when I signed up for this thing, this was my year off from cycling...right? I remember telling Connie, this might go down as one of the dumbest things I've done in a long time due do my conditioning, but had to do it when I heard you'all doing it.

I can't believe how strong you all are riding this year. Ken is going to cruise in under 9 hours at Leadville, I'd even give him two flat tires and he'd still make it under 9 hours. Ray and Juan are kicking ass also. A great group to ride with!

I tell you what, at mile 120 or whatever it was...I’m super glad I listened to my body and did not try to stay with you guys. I knew it wasn’t a matter of just riding through it, I was close to crossing the line of hurt into noman's land. What gave that away, the suttle hints…my dry-salty white arms, nausea, chills, swollen fingers and unable to digest the Hammer products. The only thing confusing me at the time, I still felt I had the leg strength, but I was slowing due to…unconsciousness? Yep, thinking those where good signs of the impending danger ahead!

I was able to dismiss our old train of thought where if you stop, you stiffen up and your done. For some reason that did not apply? I stopped and you all went on, left at a gas station in the middle of some small Indiana town. Once I slammed the 16oz of coke, then 16oz of clean, cold water I started to see straight again! I went back into the gas station and bought two more bottles of ice cold water and dumped all my Hammer nutrition stuff. (20 minute total break) I then got back on the bike and drank one of those bottles of water within the next two miles before the final rest stop. I sat down in the shade at the aid station for another 5 minutes, when I heard it was only 29 miles to the finish and you guys would be coming my way to pick my sorry excuse for a cyclist up I knew I had to give it shot. Once I got back on the bike I regained my strength and rode the entire way to the finish solo, thinking damn, sure would be nice to be swapping positions in a pace line. All in all - that stop at the gas station might have saved me a trip in the ambulance because you are in the middle of nowhere half that ride! Even after a serious bonk...I finished 73rd out of 883 finishers, it took me 8 hours, 32 minutes to ride 160 miles across Indiana in 90 degrees of pure sunshine and no shade. Huge lesson learned...know when to hold em, know when to fold em...and live to ride another day!

Thanks for pulling the ride together! it was a good time...never thought I'd cross Indiana 4 times in 24 hours!

RAIN Ride Link

MADD's Strides for Change walk 2006

2006-06-04T20:47:00.000-05:00

This Sunday Connie, Landon & I participated in MADD's Strides for Change awareness walk and fundraiser at the "Jake" in downtown Cleveland. We walked 3.1 miles in honor of Connie’s wonderful and loving sister, Cherie Marie Szucs, who was killed by a drunk driver on July 22, 2002, his second time behind the wheel under the influence.

We want to give a huge thanks to everyone who helped us exceed our goal of raising $1000.00. We don’t have the final count yet, but I think we ended slightly over $2300.00 and took second place in the team category. A big thank you to Meghan, Deborah and her family who helped raise funds for the team and to our parents who also supported the walk. Here are a couple photos of the early, humid and rainy Sunday morning. The beginning of the event was live on Channel 3 news, we got a call from a good friend who said we made the cut and got televised, to bad we didn’t have the dvr set.

Connie, Kevin and Landon kick’n it with Kenny (A local news reporter)

Landon was awe stuck and lov'n the attention of the Cavs girls!

The walk began with a slow trot on the Jacobs baseball field, the home of the Cleveland Indians. Wow, that field is nice, kinda gives you a new prespective on how far a home run actually is!

Our Guardian Angel Team

The 3 mile journey completed! Our group walked with the National president of MADD, Mr. Glynn Birch, that's right, it's not a female as you'd expect and not a mother, but a Dad who lost his 2 year old son to a Drunk Driver. He walked the entire 3 mile walk with our group and we had some very interesting conversations. I learned alot about MADD!

Landon putting the balloon hammer down...getty up daddio! He later decided to take a big ole bite out of the balloon during one of the speeches, drawing the attention of everyone...that's my boy!

Our Cycling roots...

2005-08-25T22:06:00.000-05:00

K. Daum

Do you know why you ride, take chances blazing down the single track or soaking in the scenery on a long road ride? It hit me this evening, nearly two weeks after returning from the Leadville 100 - I finally figured out where I obtained my obession and madness for cycling and the journey known as the ride. The R.I.D.E. gene comes from within my family. It appears I obtained the vital R & I genes from my grandfather, William and D & E genes from my mother and father - thus creating the near perfect R-I-D-E gene.

I was presented with the following article this summer, taken from a Mansfield newspaper 60+ years ago. My grandfather, Willam Daum age 14, his brother Jack age 16, and Cousin Richard age 18 traveled 997 miles from Mansfield, Ohio to Washington DC and back. On SINGLE SPEEDS!!! Carring their water in Canteens and the total trip only cost them $15.00 each! They slept in barns and jails for free. I spoke to my Grandfather and uncle Jack a couple months ago and the story was astonishing. I'll reflect on that conversation in the near future. Until then, click on the photo below to read the article, you should be able to enlarge the photo twice to view. Enjoy.

The Daum clan spinning on classic single speed bikes, 997 miles from Ohio to Washington DC and back - 60+ years ago!

Leadville Trail 100 - version '05

2005-08-19T13:14:00.000-05:00

If you never try, you’ll never know!
The Kevin Daum - LT100 Story

The journey to Leadville is more about the ability to overcome… as race promoter Ken Chlouber says in his opening remarks, “Dig Deep….You’re better than you think you are and you can do more than you think you can!”

My second Leadville 100 is a story about life, love and inner desire to push myself beyond where common sense screams and fights with you inner will to stop. Unbeknownst to myself, the second journey started 3 weeks before my first LT100 in 2004. It was a sunny day at the end of July, I was putting the finishing touches on my mountain bike when the love of my life, my wife Connie, tapped me on the shoulder and presented me with the gift of life. “What does that mean”, I said as I wiped the grease from my hands. She looked at me like I was joking, but I really had no idea what color represented what? “Uh, I think we need to go to the doctor before we go to Colorado. We’re pregnant! She gleamed!

Three weeks later we where in Leadville Colorado for my first LT100, what an epic experience. I drove myself into the ground, 6 feet under to be exact. I had no idea how I crossed the finish line? I zoned, zonked and blacked out! I thought it was going to be my last race, so I pushed myself beyond my limits falling short of my 9 hour goal by 45 minutes. A baby on the way, I’ll be a family man in 7 months, no way I will return to Leadville. My first LT100 in 2004 destroyed me and I did not want to return to this state of broken, mindless, senseless, and downright insane decay of body, mind and soul.
Click here for my first LT100 story.

Let me fill you in on a brief description of the LT100 before we move on. America’s highest altitude 100 mile off-road mountain bike race. “The race across the sky” is what they call it. It is one of the pinnacles of ultra distance races, both for bike and running. Yup, that’s right…they also hold a 100 mile running race, takes most participants 20-30 hours to complete and takes place the weekend after the bike race. Back to the bike race, the obvious goal is to win but that is not the vibe at this race, for 80% of the racers the goal is to survive your mind telling you to quit, find fortitude and finish the race in under 12 hours. If you finish with 9-12 hours a prized trophy is yours…a beautiful handcrafted silver belt buckle(only 60% finish within the 9-12 cut off time) Once you know you can finish in under 12 hours the race is on for the under 9 hour finish, and the coveted large “silver and gold” belt buckle, usually reserved for the top 50 racers. The bike race travels mountain trails that gain and descend 15,000 vertical feet. Hypothermia, altitude sickness, broken bones, delirium, exhaustion and lightening are just a few details that we participants encounter. The race starts in downtown Leadville at 9,000+ ft above sea level and climbs a total of five mountains on your way to the out and back 103 miles, the highest point of the race occurs around mile 50, a 12,800 foot climb up Columbine Mountain. The air is thin; the trail gets steep and your head pounds, searching for oxygen to supply the muscles and heart with the needed energy to keep systems a go! Then you turn around and descend at speeds close to 40 mph on loose and rocky fire roads, climb two more mountains and return to the town of Leadville. Are you ready?

November 2004, I’m finally recovered from my first LT100 when the postcard arrives in the mail, indicating that all entries into the 2005 race must be received soon, very soon, the next day in order to be accepted into the 2005 ultra long distance event. What do I do? My wife looks me in the eye, senses my nervous tensions and says you know what you need to do! “Don’t question yourself, go for it” she tells me. I bark back about the baby on the way, how the hell am I going to train, adjust and adapt to our new arrival. She smiled, shrugged her shoulders and said “send the entry in, we’ll find a way.”

Landon was born four months after I sent my entry in, on March 31, 2005 to be exact. A glorious day! Four days after my birthday and 135 days until my second attempt at a sub-nine hour finish at Leadville. Training was right on schedule, up til now. I knew what I had to do, but how can I do both? The search was on to find a new balance in my life - to be there for my new family and to find time for my passion in life…the bike. I fought with myself, searching for harmony; “Dig Deep” had a new meaning. Waking up with Landon three times a night and still getting up before work to get on the trainer, or to slip in a quick ride after work, before I got home. When I got the chance I would throw on my winter gear and do a 6-8 hour Sunday ride with my training partner and chief motivator Ken in the middle of a nasty, cold and salty Ohio winter. I watched in horror as my training volume was cut in half, but those hours became more specific and defined. “Is it possible?” I would ask myself as I looked in the mirror and saw the dark circles under my eyes. There came a time where I told my wife I am not going, it’s not fair to you and baby Landon. Then I would try the selfish excuse, I don’t want to put myself through the pain and agony of Leadville for another 9+ hour time, I already had the small buckle, don’t want another. I desire the coveted big daddy gold buckle reserved for the 50 or so sub nine hour finishers if I’m going to wreck my body again. She just smiled, I tried to argue why I shouldn’t go and she saw right thru me.

August 13, 2005, 5:30 am, 40 degrees, I’m lining up for my second Leadville Trail 100. I look at my 4 month old son with tears in my eyes and say this one is for you little guy. He smiles back, he knows!

At 6:30 the start gun fires off and 750 rapid and hungry mountain bikers are on for the battle of their lives. The 360 days of training, educating, and nourishing my body are behind me. The long discussions with Ken about what changes we are going to make this year are complete. This year I kept refining my diet, I’m 15 pounds lighter but still tilt the scale at 185 with a 6’-4” inch frame. I make the brutal decision to switch bikes and save even more weight by riding my hard tail bike rather then my full suspension. I decide to take less gear and food with me, lightening my load. I feel good. Damn good to be alive and descending with the pack out of downtown Leadville and into the mountains. I move up into the top 40 riders or so and go thru the mental check list. SCREECH, BAMB, POP, SLAM….the sounds you do not want to hear, they are behind me, a nasty crash at 30mph, a couple riders go down hard. I hope Ken escaped the carnage. I’m glad I pushed to get up front and out of the nervous energy in the middle of the pack. After 3 miles of gently swerving road, spreading out the pack a bit, the pace vehicle pulls off and the race is on. I’m up front and watch as the leaders find their rhythm. I watch the other Ohio rider Garth, (a top 20 finisher several times) stand up and puts the power to the cranks and catches the main group. I hang on to the back of pack and drop into my zone. I watch as the leaders race up the first hill, St. Keven…they are gone!

Click here to view a video of the start of the LT100. You gotta see what 700+ riders looks like (I had no idea)

small file-faster download
LT100 Start

large file-slow download
LT100 Start

The race has 5 time check points, they are there for safety sake, everyone is encouraged to continue, even if they are off the pace, but will eventually be pulled from the race if they can not complete the 103 mile race in under 13 hour time pace. I had studied the check point times and had planned for a nine hour race. The split times where taped to my handle bars. My own race was forming, the race from checkpoint to checkpoint.

STATION....Time Goals..Actual Time In/Elapsed Time Place
Start
Pipeline - Pass 1.....2:00....8:28:00./.001:58:00...........33
Twin Lakes - Pass 1...2:44....09:12:00./.002:42:00..........34
Columbine Mine........4:30....11:09:00./.004:39:00..........53 (the climb)
Twin Lakes Pass 2.....5:10....11:42:00./.005:12:00..........59
Pipeline Pass 2.......6:10....12:38:00./.006:08:00..........56
Finish................8:57....15:18:56./.008:48:56..........58

I could not believe Ken & I started the morning with no breakfast, yes, that’s correct…no food leading up to the race. I’ve been studying nutrition for a bit, still have a lot to learn, but we picked up a ton of knowledge from Hammer Nutrition. The food you eat in the hours leading up to an ultra event have the potential to sit in your stomach and cause huge problems later in the race (ask Ken about 2004) We started our 100% liquid nutrition diet from the start line. No solid food for 8 hours leading up to the event, and none during the 9 hour attempt. I felt great.

I made it up the first mountain, St. Keven and down the other side, then made the climb up Haggerman Pass which leads up to the 2nd mountain of the day. Then the ever popular Powerline decent. A 15 minute downhill joy ride through rocks, water bars and huge rain ruts - a giant smile on my face…I was relaxed and having a good time. What made the downhills so much fun is our preparation. The week before the race, my family drove out to Colorado to help crew for the race. My dad volunteered to drive Ken and I up to the top of each mountain, sometimes twice. So we could save our climbing legs for the race and master the downhills. I hope my father realizes how much that helped us, knowing which turns we needed to snag a tad of brake and others we could take at full speed. So the Powerline held no real surprises this year, it was rough, nasty and pretty darn predictable. Thanks Dad! The race was on to check point one!

I made it to check point one, looked at my time…I was two minutes faster then I needed to be, that was good. I knew the big climb was coming after the next aid station. I worked with several guys, actually…one guy pulled the entire pipeline. I was ready to exchange pulls, but he kept a good pace and never looked for help. I was in 34th place at the bottom of the climb and right on schedule, but the bastard climb was right underneath my tires! I had worked and trained on the hills as much as I could, but I still weighed 50 pounds more then most of the sub-nine Colorado finishers. Last year I lost over 40 positions on this climb…well…I dropped into my climbing zone and went at it. By the time I was at the top, I only lost 20 positions, I wasn’t happy, but a good improvement over 2004, and I felt 100% better then last year. I snatched some watermelon slices, grabbed my bike and began the descent. The entire mountain from top to bottom was filled with riders ascending to the top, the determination on everyone faces told a different story about way they were there. A senator, a governor, a cancer survivor, doctors, lawyers, all together with a common bond of hurt and fortitude; we were all connected in our own personal goal of conquering this race.

The race was on to check point 4, the final crew station. After dropping time on the climb, I recovered a couple of minutes on the descent. On the pipeline, I again worked with several guys the entire way, the strong guys pulled for minutes, the weaker for a couple of seconds, giving what they had but each contributing…until the end of the race that is…we’ll get to that in a minute.

I made it back to the final check point, 5 minutes ahead of schedule. The sub nine is within reach if I don’t blow up! I try not to think about it. I decide on just two water bottles, some Hammer Nutrition pills and I was off. Hooked up with another guy and we worked the road back to the Powerline, trying to get others on board as we passed them. Then it appeared…the POWERLINE, the monster climb at around mile 80. I rode up the first part as much as I could…way to much as a matter of fact. As I dismounted to begin the hike-a-bike I was out of breath and my head was spinning and throbbing - I thought I was loosing it. I rested my head on the handle bars for a few moments, nobody that passed me asked; they were all going thru the same thing. I opened my eyes and saw the pictures of Landon I had taped to my handlebars.

I smiled, grabbed my bike and pushed on. After the push I jumped on my bike and did not get off til the finish line. I set a pace I was comfortable with, I did not care if anyone passed me, ½ hour later I was at the top of dreaded climb number 4. A guy behind me gently spoke between breaths “way to go - perfect pace”. Danny was his name, Brenkenridge was his game. He was on my wheel the entire climb. Last year I stopped several times on this climb and walked. This year, aside from the lower half, I rode the entire thing. I was shocked, personal goal achieved! I talked a bit with the rider, it was his second year also. He finished 4 minutes ahead of me last year but he had also done the running race. I descended the next hill a bit faster but he caught up to me on the next climb and set a perfect pace. Nothing was said, middle ring climb for a good 20 minutes, it was my turn to get on his wheel. We made it to the mini-check point at 8 hours. We had instant respect for each other. I had a managed a sub-nine smeark as a volunteer filled my bottle with water…I think I have it…9 hours that is. I continued the climb and then the descent down St. Keven’s. (during the awards I learned that there were several nasty accidents here, broken leg, broken collar bone, broken tail bone, concussion) Made it to the bottom and I latched onto another riders wheel, he got tired and I jumped up front for a long time. I slowed and pulled off a bit, 5 guys behind me and nobody jumped up to take a pull. I know we all had the goal of a sub nine hour finish and we were on the bubble…lets work together. Then Danny from Breckenridge caught the group, he smiled and said it’s my turn, sit in for bit. We exchanged several pulls, with the same guys on the back. When we hit the road, Danny yelled, “do any of you know what a pace line is?….come-on…let’s work together.” (On a side note... Mtn bikers are hilarious when they try to organize a pace line - taken from Fat Cyclist Blog comment) At that time a few guys tried, but I think they were cooked. After a while Danny and I looked at each other and we took off, two guys hung on and then only one.

We hit the Boulevard climb, 3 miles to go! Just Danny and I. Last year I was crushed by this section, little ring and walking. This year middle ring and 10-14 mph…Danny and I were hurt’n, yet cruising towards sub-nine. We hit the cement and crested the hill, saw the finish line and we smiled. We decided we would cross the finish line together. We slowed down a bit, nothing to worry about, 13 minutes to go til 9 hour cut off time. Then out of nowhere comes these guys sprinting passed us. I look at Danny, Danny looks at me. I told Danny, sorry, I can’t let this happen. I tossed the chain into the big ring, stood up and hammered down. I heard the announcer yell, “it looks like we have a race!” The crowd got excited as the finish line neared, then the competition folded, submitted, he had no more. I glanced back and shook my head. I could not believe this guy, after Danny and I pulled him to a sub-nine finish, but hey...thats racing, ain't it! I was looking forward to crossing the line with Danny. Connie came running up and exclaimed “that was awesome, you just gave him THE LOOK” (referring to the famous Lance Armstrong to Jan Ullrich look at the Tour de France) Danny pulled up next to me, three places behind me and shook his head. I was gasping for air after the sprint, but managed a sub-nine grin. We shook hands to a job well done and he invited me out to Breckenridge to show me his home town trails. No doubt…I’ll find a way to get there! (one a side note, the racer who passed us came up after the finish and thanked us for pulling him in, he said he had the speed coming down the hill and had to give it a try)

I took off my helmet and let it soak in. Ohio boy gets sub-nine! Goal accomplished! I caught my breath and looked for Danny. I forgot to get his contact info…he was gone! I asked Connie if this guy existed or was it an illusion. She smiled, he just left, you’ll see him at the awards. I looked over and saw Karen, Ken’s wife…I knew if she was there Ken was on the way. Would he break nine hours also? Sweet! She said he was 16 minutes behind me at the last check point. Way to go Ken! To be honest, I thought Ken would crush me this year. He set the tone for our training and helped push me through some very rough weeks. I knew when I was not training he was, so I would get up and go pound some pavement when I should have been catching up on some sleep. Ken also visited Mt. Mitchell twice this year to train for the Columbine climb, on the weekend of Landon’s birth non the less. I looked at my watch, “dang” I thought, he’s going to punish his finishing time of last year…right on! 33 minutes later we looked down the road, not sure who the rider was until I noticed the sure fire swagger of Ken’s pushed past the limits body language. He beat his last year time by over 1:38 minutes! His training and planning sure paid off this year! Way to go Ken!

The one thing that really hit home to me at this year Leadville 100 is there is always room for improvement and never underestimate or doubt yourself. Motivation comes from everywhere, find it. The top finisher and winner this year was three time Champion Dave Wiens, he is over 40 years old and finished in 7 hours, 17 minutes. I have room for improvement and years to do it. I’m contemplating a return for a shot at sub-eight one of these years. On the way home that night I was looking out the windows at the surrounding mountains and I had a vision. A tandem bike, my son Landon and I, gunning for a sub-nine finish. Time will tell.

Thanks again to my parents for coming out and crewing for the second straight year. Could not have done it without ya! Thanks again to my parents for watching baby Landon during the race and while I was training. Thanks to Tim, for the two weeks off work so I could acclimate to the altitude and thin air. Thanks Kellie for letting some of her RAAM knowledge help me with this small race. To Ken for the training, coordination, motivation and RV. The Rogue Mechanic for “dialing in” a sub-nine race bike and back up rig. Solon Bicycle - need a bike…ask for Dan. To our sponsors, Rock Shox, Avid, Rudy, Clear Choice, Hammer Nutrition! Most of all…thanks to my wife, who never doubted my ability to return to Leadville. It was a crazy and tough return, but our relationship has flourished and our bond is ever so greater due to the magic and mystery that surrounds this larger then life event. And to my chief motivator, my son, Landon, who smiled and laughed when we walked up to receive the gold buckle at the awards ceremony. I hope to cross the finish line with you one day, if you decide to guide yourself down this mysterious road called Leadville.

A few photos of the two weeks spent in Colorado. Conquering another 14er – Mt Lincoln and Cameron. Riding the Monarc Trail in Salida. Randy and I jumping off a mountain outside of Vail and soaring with the eagles.

Leadville 100 Start - the video

2005-08-18T21:56:00.000-05:00

Click here to view a video of the start of the LT100.

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LT100 Start

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LT100 Start

LEADVILLE 100 - take 2

2005-08-17T19:56:00.000-05:00

Why?
The Ken Frankenbery LT100 Story

Well that seems to be the question everyone asks. After almost killing me last year, (and right after the race swearing I would never ever do this race again) why go back? A couple of reasons.

1. The Leadville 100 is the best supported-most organized race I have ever done. The town is 100% behind the race. From the time you get into town, to the time you leave-people are super. Last year while coming into town at the end of the race, (In a near death state), an older women cutting Her grass, stopped to cheer me on! - The Vibe for this race is awesome. The people who put it on are super. Plus the town and area are beautiful. From the old restored buildings downtown, to the gorgeous mountains and forest, it’s an outdoor persons dream. The more time I spend there, the more I fall in love with the town. That and a chance to spend 2 weeks in Colorado, where big factors

2. Even though I finished last year, after some reflection, I felt if I was better prepared, I could do much better. The whole race just left a bad taste in my mouth (and I don’t mean from getting sick and throwing up at mile 70) I just felt like my finish position (296 out of 750), or my time (11.02), was a reflection of what I was capable of .I wanted to leave Leadville knowing I gave it my best.

After talking with Kevin, he also had some unresolved issues. He finished in 9.45, and those familiar with the race know that of the 750 people who start the race, only a little over ½ finish. Those who do, get a Silver Belt buckle. But those few that can do it under 9 hours get a huge Gold Buckle. Kevin felt with what we learned last year, He wanted to go back and get a coveted Gold Buckle.

So it was on! The crew this year was Karen-Randy-Brenda & Kevin. Kevin’s family and Connie would drive out and meet us.

Prologue

Last year we spent two weeks getting used to the altitude in Colorado before the race, and besides having a great 2 week vacation, it seemed to help us adapt to the altitude (well as much as people who lives at Sea Level can adapt).

So this year we had the same plan, but try to visit a different part of Colorado-while working our way up in elevation...

We started in Colorado Springs- a neat town, but no Boulder (Boulder is one of my favorite spots- very bike friendly-clean –a must see place for bikers). We did a couple neat rides around Colorado Springs, best was a 15-mile loop around Rampart Reservoir just west of Colorado Springs, it was like riding on the buckeye trail (not that I would ever do that!), with great views.

A trip to the U.S. Olympic center, some cool hiking, exploring some old caves, a drive up to Pikes Peak and checking out the city made several days fly by.

Our next stop was at Cannon City, where we got a great view of the “Great Gorge”
After, we drove to Salida Colorado- a cool little town, kind of like Moab Utah. Some awesome rides in the area, but so many to choose from it was hard to pick just one. We ended up doing part of the Colorado trail, where it follows The Continental Divide trail. We had Karen drive us up to Monarch Pass- about 12 thousand feet, where we caught the trail, and rode it just past Marshall Pass, not far from Salida. It was some of the best single track I have ridden, with awesome views as you rode across the top of the continental divide. The trail would drop down, and every few miles duck in deep Aspen forests, rock gardens, this trail had it all.

Then after about 16 miles, we start descending. This stretch was non- stop rocks and jumps at 40 mph!

We fit in a couple great hikes, Mt Lincoln & Mt Elbert – 2- 14 thousand footers which are adjacent to each other (And a lesson that even on cloudy cool days at 14 thousand feet you need sun tan lotion! Ouch! The back of Kevin’s neck was glowing red) Karen and Brenda did a great job on the hike, soldering up to near 14 thousand!

I love the people in Colorado- very into the outdoor life style-in general most people you meet are super nice.

Interesting billboard in a shop in Salida

“At Least when Clinton Lied-Nobody Died!!”

Amen is all I will say to that.

It was hard to leave Salida- I defiantly want to stop back there, but it was time to head up to over 10,000 feet-Leadville!

Leadville

Cool town-lots of restored old homes and buildings. Neat restaurants, coffee shops and stores (if you ever go there go to Melanzana’s outdoor clothing store-they make there own clothing right in the shop). Then just 2 miles from Main Street, great forests, mountains and awesome views.

A couple days of short hikes, check out some local mines, take the Railroad tour, drive over to Aspen and of course ride parts of the racecourse each day. It was tough not to ride too much, but one lesson I learned last year, a race like Leadville demands you rest up for weeks in advance, you will need everything you have.

The weather leading up to the race was ugly. Rain everyday, cool temperatures (In the 30’s at night and some days not hitting much over 60) Anyone who has been out west knows when it rains, it not like when it rains in Ohio- storms come up fast, the temperature drops even faster. This is another factor in making Leadville so tough-last year race started at 630am it was 35 degree’s; by noon it was in the 80’s. In the past, people have been pulled off the course with hypothermia. I will never forget talking to Jim Olander (Who had been out to Leadville twice) before I went, and I asked Him what kind of gear I should bring for the race- His reply was fast and accurate- bring everything you got, cold weather gear, rain suits, cut off jersey’s sun tan lotion, lots of gloves (winter –and summer) and be ready you could use everything in one day!

The Race

The forecast looked cool and wet. But at 5am, it was a not so bad, 42-degree’s. We got there early to get a decent starting spot (it’s first come and people are there before 5am- the race starts at 630) Kevin wanted to get a spot up front; I went a few rows behind him.

The start was worse than normal. For anyone who has done large road races, you know how scary a tight pack of 100’s of riders can be. Well imagine 750 mountain bike racers, starting down hill in a pack, going down a curvy paved road, with several 90-degree turns. At 40 mph.

We did not go 500 yards before the first crash. I heard tires screech, and the sound of metal on the road just behind me, the first pile up. Another mile down the road and I see a bike flipping in the air, 2 guys had touched wheels and went down hard.

We hit the dirt, and the top 50 guys go at an all out sprint to get away from the crowd, Kevin is with them. I back off a hair, I want to be near the front, but do not want to spend all my quarters-this is a long race and I want to try to pace myself this year.

Things go well up first climb, down St Kevin’s, and threw Hagerman pass. We hit the top of The power line, and I am totally focused. This is the toughest downhill on the course. Ruts, rocks, on a downhill that’s over 5 miles straight down! I pick off several people, take some big time chances, but end up picking up several places and feel great. I hook up with a few people and we do a pace line to first check point. I hit it at 2.00, and this year, no stopping. Karen hands me a new water bottle, and I am off. I hook up with 3 guys and we work all the way to the next rest stop. I am feeling great, and way ahead of last year. I grab a camel back (it looks like rain, so I play it safe take a jacket & extra gloves), and am off to the toughest climb-Columbine- 3000 feet of climbing. It’s just as brutal as last year, and I go back in forth thinking I feel 100% better than last year, to thinking why the heck am I doing this? If my job were this hard I would have quit years ago. A few guys pass me, but I am doing well. Just a ¼ mile from the summit, Kevin pass’s me going down. I feel great, counting the riders going down, I know he is in top 60, and I am not far behind. At the top I am in 107 place, more important right on my goal time of 4.50 and unlike most others I do not stop. There are storm clouds, its 25-degree’s colder, no oxygen (its almost 13,000 feet at the top), and all I want to do is get down. As I start down (the top is super rocky and steep), I look at my watch and think this is it- if I am going to do well; I need to take some chances. I let it rip, and start picking off riders left and right. I know I am on the edge, but keep it going. When I get to the bottom, a few guys get me back on the flats over to check point 3, but I pick up several places from the summit-worth the risks! I ride alone, and hit check point 3 at 6.24, over 45 minute’s better than last year, and 20 minutes ahead of my goal time. I just grab a bottle, look back and rain clouds are coming! I am at checkpoint 4 at 6.24, almost an hour ahead of last year. Karen tells me Kevin is 16 minutes ahead, and looking good- I am happy, I have no illusion of beating him, (Just His time He set last year), I want to see Him get the Gold!

At mile 80, we hit the power line. What was a killer downhill is now a hike a bike straight up for 5 miles! I make it, and at the top lightning strikes off in the distance, and thunder booms threw the valley’s- this is not looking good! I look at time, 12 miles to go, and one more big climb up the Hagerman pass- I am starting to hurt bad, but keep a good pace going, maybe 2 people pass me. I hit the top of St Kevin’s and still no rain, I again take some big chances on the downhill, pass 2-3 guys and hit the bottom with only 5 miles to go. I am at 8 hours 50 minutes, and it hits me, I am not going to make 9 hours, but darn close- I realize now that I will beat my goal (9hours 45 minutes), and I start to get kind of emotional. That’s one of the things that’s hard to explain to people about races like this. You go threw the gamete on emotions. There were times going up the power line climb, where I was pushing my bike for miles, I just wanted to pull over and curl in a ball and lay there. There were times flying down the hills, passing people, I felt a high no drug could ever produce-I felt like super man. Then there’s the other riders-you push side by side with people, both suffering in silence, maybe a word here or there, and you suddenly feel a bond with people you don’t even know. A sense of being part of something that’s bigger than you. You notice the smallest details, yet at times you’re so focused on the job at hand you don’t notice the obvious. It’s something you carry with you for years- I remember driving my car down the freeway, months after last years race, and getting a flashback about the race- it’s something that you just can’t explain, but it carries into every aspect of your life. I can think of several times, things getting tough, and I would think, compared to the pain and agony I suffered at Leadville-this is nothing. Sounds corny I know, but when you talk to people who have done the race, they say the same thing.

I am pushing it for all I have now, but the guys I passed on downhill get me, plus a couple others. The clouds let out a couple drizzle’s, but for some reason it is not raining, its raining a; around us, but not on us- I can see the rain as I start the uphill into town, and at 102 miles (the actual mileage to the race is 103.5), I start to come unglued. The hill into town is not that big, but I am in the little chain ring, weaving bad, back and forth just to keep moving forward. I am starting to see black spots. I have to stand and pedal to make the last grade, and it takes everything out of me. As I cross the finish line, Karen is there- She starts to take my bike, and the next thing I know, I am on the ground with people around me yelling to not try to get up (Get up, Hell I don’t even know where I am or who I am!!). I fade in and out, and next thing I recall Kevin’s dad is caring me off the road to sit out of the way. When I crossed the line, I blacked out, I hit pretty hard (road rash on my side, knot on my knee), I can’t believe I make 100+ miles of pure hell without a scratch, then get hurt at the finish line in front of hundreds of people!

As I start to come around, I see Kevin, and know by the look on His face, He made it under 9 hours-I ask, He nods, great job, He is one of the top “ Non Colorado” riders in the race and gets the Gold!! I was in at 9.21.

We pick up our awards on Sunday; an awesome awards presentation, with some great stories from the race.

Epilogue

Kevin made His goal, and with a new family (He and His new Son Landon went together to get His awards it was great!), He most likely will not be back to Leadville for a few years (Plans to win the tandem title as a father son duo are in the works)

For me, I feel like I am leaving Leadville having met my goal, I posted a time I am proud of and if I never go back, I will feel like I had a life experience many never get to do.

But, there is that matter of the Gold Belt Buckle?????

12 Hour Solo Race - Vulture's Knob Witches Brew Endurance Race Series

2005-05-31T13:06:00.001-05:00

The thunder rumbled in the near distance, the taste and feel of the air was beginning to transform, my lungs sensed the change. The race was going to undergo a drastic change, pedal hard, ride smart and go fast. I was feeling scary strong; this could not last all 12 hours, could it? The rhythm and flow was right on, a picture perfect start. The trail, oh the sweet trail was beyond mint, near perfect!

2 ½ hours prior, the race started with the sound of the famous VKnob “quack” duck call. We racers ran a short loop to spread out the pack, before grabbing our bikes for the 12 hour Vulture's Knob mountain bike race series titled "Witches Brew". I remembered last years run in which I went out slow, trying to pace myself and fell behind a few less experienced riders on the first lap. One of whom took a nasty dive in the rock tunnel taking me and several other riders down. That was not happening this year, as I was third in the run to the bikes and we were off. Once on the bike, I could not wipe the grin off my face. The trail was perfect, and fast. Mike Walewski got out in front and set the solo pace, wicked fast. I knew I was outside my zones, but what the heck, this was a training race, a time to experiment. Let’s see what breaks me.

rock tunnel

It was a full course green light, lower Killbuck, all hills, everything, just as it should be. I actually could not believe they added the lower Killbuck section, the 1/4 mile of log bridges we’re out, (apparently beaver had dam’d up that part of the course?) but the old trail next to the river was brought back to life. Why my disbelief, because there was a 50% forecast of rain, and that whole section gets heavy with water. But, wow was it flowing good…nice, dry and fast. If the rain holds off, race director Mark is the hero. If it rains…this will be the section designed by some sicko who watches and enjoys needless suffering.

elevated bridges in the swamp of lower Killbuck

The first laps went well (9ish mile laps) and were fast indeed for a 12 hour pace… 1) 51.ish 2) 51.05. (to my crew tent) Then on the end of the 3rd lap the skies opened up. I was near the over/under rock bridge and had to drop my glasses because the day became the night. The temperature dropped 10-15 degrees and the wind whooped up. The deep thunder roared all around the course, then we heard the rain hit the canopy of trees overhead. The trees held off the inevitable drenching for a few minutes, then the wetness broke through. I made it back in 55.30 + pit stop. The course was getting slick. I was chilled, grabbed a jacket, some more rocket fuel and I was off. Still feeling good, I was convincing myself to look forward to rain as an experiment in what to wear, and how to ride for this years under 9 hour attempt at the Leadville 100. This race was setting up to be the perfect experiment in equipment, clothing, nutrition and mental attitude. The 4th lap held a slight adaptation curve. The course was getting glossy. Not thinking much, I approached the infamous “cradle”, (off camber, rooted approach that shoots you like a cannon directly down a gully and into a u-shaped bridge that hugs the lower gully and looks like a cradle) I cleared all the roots in the typical approach, made the turn then slammed into the hillside as my front tire washed out on the wet, slick hard pack. It was slow motion, like a turtle flipped upside down spinning uncontrolled, I slid down the hillside. Nothing to grab onto, the water, my bike and my body slithered in the mud until a tree broke our fall and prevented us from dropping further into the gully. I jumped up, my gloves, covered in mud untwisted my handlebars from the frame, I surveyed the damage and I was on. Up the climb to the next downhill, when I went to grab my rear brake, the level pulled all the way to bar…nothing, well maybe a little something, but I could not tell. The next 8 miles were fun, to say the least. Lower Killbuck immediately turned into the famous mix of heavy, slick, nasty, slow going, peanut butter muck that is typical of river banks.

From here on, it was tough to figure out what was going down, everyone was so spread out. I got back to tent, spent a lot of time clearing the muck off the bike so I could get at my brakes. Finally, made every adjustment possible to no avail. I thought about switching bikes, but opted to destroy only one. I jumped back on the bike, and somehow all systems were go, the brakes worked themselves out. The lap times moved down to 1:10 – 1:15ish + pit stops. My confidence was gone in the cradle, though. As each lap I talk myself into riding it. Then bailing out each and every time as visions of my bloodied/muddied knee would enter my weak and simple mind. I opt’d to run down the hill instead, eating up time and my ego, but it was the safe thing to do…right? (“freak’n wimp” I screamed at myself) The sun would come and go, the clouds would pass, leaving a few drops here and there until the daylight was laid to rest.

one of many hollowed out 1/2 log bridges

There is something about riding at night that I truly enjoy. Everything changes as the night divides the day. I kept my lights off as long as possible and finally flipped the switch on the road to the upper section. When I started the climb out of valley I heard the strangest sound. My mind was a bit sappy but it sounded off again. It was the oddest sound, but it was strangely comforting. It seemed as if it was trying to tell us something. Was he welcoming us into his house or warning us of pending danger. A few minutes later, the same noise, only louder. It seemed to be an owl with a good set of Vulture's Knob lungs, or race director, Mark, was hiding in the woods with one of his duck calls gone lame. I rode most of the night laps alone, looking around you can see other racer’s lights, but we never crossed paths. It was very unusual, yet very serene. I looked forward to hearing the hoots and howlers of the nocturnal creature as I entered its house during each night lap. I felt at home.

rainbow bridge

I ended my 9th lap and sat at the tent with my crew pondering another lap at the 11th hour. I had a quarter tank left, but did not want to endure the Killbuck muck. I was sitting in second place, a lap ahead of the third place rider. That’s when the first place solo rider, Mike, passed me and I decided to check in at the scorer’s tent to see what was happening. While we were there, the third place solo rider checked in also. We all looked at each other and decided to hang it up, the race was well laid out and it was to nobody’s advantage to go out and risk another lap.

Well, to the true VKnob spirit, I must say the giant witch’s brew kettle was stirred a little strong, but it was tasty none the less. A job well done.

Thanks yet again to my fantastic crew – my Dad, who persevered the nasty weather and kept me going each and every lap. And to my wife Connie, who kept our two month old occupied during the day and came to the race to offer up much needed night time support and encouragement. Just her showing up in the late hours gave me another ounce of energy to keep going. My mother - who watched Landon during the night time laps from the comfort of her home. A job well done to the Miranda’s and volunteers who kept the scorer’s table enjoyable each and every lap.

12 hours (turned 11 hours) of VKnob Witch’s Brew Endurance Series 2005 Race #1

1) Mike Walewski – 10 Laps
2) Kevin Daum – 9 laps
3) Darin Evans - 8 Laps
4-10) unknown

vulturesknob - course website

www.kaslanphoto.com - more photos

Thanks for reading - Kevin Daum

Valley Circuit Spring Training Series Race #5.

2005-05-09T10:45:00.000-05:00

Weather was cool, yet refreshing. A good turnout of cat 3, 4, & 5 totaling 40+ racers in the "B" class. Snakebite, Orrville, Summit Freewheelers, Stark Velo and more. Ross, Steve, Jason and I entered for a little spring race training. Since this was the last race of the series an extra lap was added making for a 6 lap, 30 mile fast paced ride. (23mph avg) I think this was the first race in this series for all of us? Mad man Ross found out he needs a major road bike tune up as he pulled off the front on the first lap to fix a loose skewer, twice. Steve and I witnessed several solo attacks that were short lived due to the windy front mother nature presented. You'd think we'd watch, observe and learn, but for some strange reason Steve and I still wanted to have a little fun and try a break. Steve lead out on lap 4 and I jumped on. Nobody followed us into the wind as we had a short gap on the group. The plan was not having a plan, neither of us have much road racing knowledge. Looking back, I don't know why we did not work this together, instead, he lead me out and I tried to take off. I got off the front a bit, about half a lap later I broke as I battled the wind by myself. I slowly sat up, grabbed my water bottle and waited for the main field. I sat in and recovered a bit while Steve jumped up front and did alot of the work alternating with a few guys. The sprint to the finish was typical, Brett Davis from Snakebite took off early to stretch the pack out which greatly increased our safety. A bunch of his teammates jumped to the front and lead the charge, very well done I must admit. Then as the burn tore into our legs the sprinters danced the width of the road in a chaotic mass finish.... I tried to figure where we finished...we're guessing 9th for Steve and 6th for myself? Matt Turi took the gold on this day.

- KDaum

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Valley Circuit Spring Training Series Race #5.