Harpeth Racing team Category 4 racer Mitch Boult traveled down to Steele, Alabama for the B race of the Camp Sumatanga Simple Joe’s winter training race series.

The course was a 10 mile rolling loop, four laps. Road surface was good and traffic was controlled. All in all it was about the best organized race I’ve seen – even starting on time. Camp Sumatanga is in Northern Alabama and the race series attracted teams from Tuscaloosa, Birmingham, and Huntsville. The quality of riders was high, both in terms of fitness and skill on the road.

It was 48 degrees at race time, and there was something about that temp that made it hard to decide what to wear. By the time I got that sorted out the race was about to start and I was the last one to the line, behind about 50 riders.

The first few miles miles was fast, like a crit start, and I was on the limit, barely hanging on. This was my first B race and I was thinking I should have stayed at Cat 5. But after a while the pace slowed enough for me to take a drink and recover.

After the first lap there were some surges, and some scrambling to stay in the lead group, but the pace wasn’t too bad. I stayed out of the action up front, just sat on.

As we entered the final lap I started trying to move up but at a certain point hit a logjam. The rider next to me said “Forget it dude. Your race is over.”  He was right. We were jammed into a single lane and there was an impenetrable wall of riders in front of me, from the center line to the gutter, and it was like that all the way to the front. We had been warned that crossing the yellow line would mean instant disqualification, and I could see the official’s car behind me. There was just no way. In retrospect I should have moved up sooner.

Most of the riders had ridden the event before and the peloton was comfortable and non-sketchy. The only thing that was at all questionable happened at mile 37 when this guy in front of me screams “I’m cramping!” and stops pedaling. As the tightly packed riders skittered around him he said, helpfully, “Go ahead and pass me. It’s alright”. I finished the race roughly mid pack in the lead group.

I had been looking forward to this race since my DNF four weeks ago in January. After an early dinner and a good, if fitful night’s sleep, Jonathan and I were geared up by 7:30am  and headed to the “Snake Pit” at the Trade Center. We got signed in, and planned on sitting in the warm car until the shuttles started to load. After loading our bikes onto the trailers, we returned to the car to find it locked. With the keys inside. Along with our water bottles, helmets, and camelbaks.

Fearing a repeat of January’s RV hydraulics debacle that put us on the race course almost an hour after most riders had started, I went into quiet panic mode. Luckily, 30 minutes later we had the car unlocked (thanks to the towing company owned by the father of one of the race volunteers) and were seated in one of the shuttles to the race start. Panic mode was quickly replaced by pre-race jitters.

In years past, the shuttle to the race start has been provided by old, used up school buses driven by crazed blue-hairs with no reason left to live. After we signed up for this year’s race, Fred told us about a past year when the combined weight of 50 adults (as opposed to 50 4th graders) overwhelmed the brakes of one of the shuttle buses as they were driving down a mountain road. The driver was passing cars in the oncoming lane on a curvy, poorly paved road, all the while cackling madly. This year the buses have been replaced by more modern transportation and slightly less deranged drivers.

Since Snake Creek Gap is a time trial event, everyone started individually with around a 30 second gap between riders. You ride up to the line, a race official counts you down, and you are off. I left around 9:30am. I settled into an easy pace and let Jonathan try to chase a group of money class riders who caught up after starting just behind us. Two miles later I reached “Dry Creek”, which was anything but. The water was upper thigh deep and moving swiftly. Jonathan was waiting at the banks of the creek because he wanted to see my reaction to this first obstacle. With no other options, we shouldered our bikes, slogged through it, and quickly got underway; hoping that movement would keep us warmer than stopping to change into dry socks.

If the high creek wasn’t an obvious indicator of the rain that North Georgia had received in the past week, the mud was. Soon after beginning the first climb, I started to get chainsuck every few minutes. Every time the trail would pitch up, I would hear the chain threaten to bind against the chainstay. I quickly lost Jonathan, and settled into a rhythm of climb, stop, swear, walk. The downhills posed no problem, and the trail offered a surprising level of traction in the mud, so I tried to regain a little time whenever the trail pointed down.

By around 12:30 I crossed the road and entered the parking lot of the halfway point. I was still feeling good, but knew that I had 17 more long miles to go. I stayed at the aid station just long enough to mix another bottle of Hammer Perpetuem, and headed back onto the trail. There were several people with damaged bikes who were forced to bail out by this point. Between missing derailleurs, broken chains, flat tires, and used up brake pads, 27 of the 108 riders who started the 34 mile route weren’t able to finish.

The trail from the 17 mile Aid Station immediately pitches up into a long climb to the top of the ridge. Just like before, my chain would suck into the chainstay every time I applied additional torque. If I listened closely enough, I could pick up the warning sounds and backpedal quickly to clear the chain before my bike stopped cold. Even with this setback, the top of the ridge came faster than I remembered it from the January race.

At the bottom of a long downhill, I decided to finally change into a pair of dry socks. Another rider rolled to a stop on the trail next to me and spoke into a radio “Last rider on the 34 down here near the creek before the fire road Sag”. He meant me. We rode to the base of the fire road climb, where chainsuck stopped my bike right in the middle of a creek crossing. Dry socks now wet.

The fire road climb to the last aid station was muddy and longer than I remembered from January. Trace (my new riding buddy) and I sprayed our chains down with chain lube again to try to free up some of the grime that was contributing to my chainsuck problem. It was just before 3pm at this point, but there were only 8 miles to go, and only 6 miles left before the pavement descent back to the start.

It’s a bit misleading to say “6 miles left” as if it is a short distance. Anyone who has completed this ride can attest that this particular 6 miles is the hardest part of the entire 34 miles, and likely the hardest part of the entire 100+ mile Pinhoti Trail in Georgia. Almost immediately after turning from the aid station back onto singletrack, the rock gardens start. And don’t stop.

“I don’t have any strength left to finesse my way through this. ” I said to Trace, who responded “There’s no finessing this stuff, you just have to power through it. Momentum is your friend.” Good advice, but momentum was getting harder and harder to maintain.

The additional torque required to clean these rock gardens, in addition to the 30 odd miles I had already ridden that day was quickly taking it’s toll. Every time I would shift my weight, or apply power to ride through a pile of volleyball sized rocks, my quads would threaten to cramp. Many of the rocky sections were too technical for the level of fatigue I was experiencing, but dismounting didn’t make things any easier. Each dismount meant walking through the cramping while pushing a 25 lb bike. After pushing my bike up an incredibly steep section that locals refer to as “The Wall” (maxing out at 34% grade), Trace said “I have good news and bad news. Good news is we’re done climbing. Bad news is the most technical section is between here and the radio towers”.

Any endurance athlete can relate to the “dark place” that you sometimes find yourself in during an event. It is that point where the body or mind may each be willing (protesting, but willing), but the combination of physical fatigue and mental exhaustion starts to become overwhelming. In this last 6 miles, I spent a lot of time in that dark place, and it was no additional comfort to hear Trace’s GPS beep every time he stopped to let me rest. The last thing I needed was a reminder of how slow I was moving from a local who rides this trail regularly.

Even with my slow progress we continued to press forward. Ride for a bit on a smooth section, dismount when I would fail to muster support from “friend momentum” to carry me through. Eventually the radio towers came into view at the top of the last rise. The trail smoothed out, and I could hear the generators at the base of the towers humming as we rode out of the forest onto a gravel road.

With all of the fatigue and cramping replaced by elation that I had actually finished this race, we rocketed down the gravel road to the trailhead. Once back on pavement I tucked in tight and held on for the 40 mph descent down the mountain to the Trade Center. Even though the parking lot was mostly empty I sprinted for the finish line and crossed it under power, 6 hours and 32 minutes after I started.

Jonathan, who finished the race in 6 hrs, 14 minutes adds this comment:

I was absolutely miserable for 30 of the 34 miles with feet frozen and soaked. Soon the numbness from toes and feet started to creep into my legs turning them into ice cycles attached to ice cubes. There was no amount of miles, spinning, cranking or hard peddling to counter the cold and keep my legs from this incurable cold exhaustion. There was no strength left in my legs. The wet cold simply zapped them into worthless scrap. My new TiMax functioned flawlessly and the race was no match for it. This race was a test of mind over matter. Not fun, enjoyable or fondly remembered. Although, we will be back in March…

- Jonathan

More information about the Pinhoti Trail system, the Snake Creek Gap Time Trial series, and this year’s results can be found at the Northwest Georgia SORBA (Southern Offroad Bicycle Association) website at http://www.nwgasorba.org/the_snake.html

Some rides are ill-fated from the start. These are the ones where you left one shoe cover at home, or found a bulge in your tire from a torn casing, or your water bottles leak Perpetuem all over your frame as you drive to the shop. Sometimes you feel like hanging it up before you even turn a pedal.

Other rides start out great and then surprise you with circumstances that challenge your willingness to suffer. You can’t plan for these situations, but these are the rides that you remember as being “epic”.

The team had one such epic a few weeks ago when we were caught by a surprise cold rain 20 miles from the end of the ride. We could have made the decision to ride through it, but it was cold enough that it would have invited hypothermia. Instead we bivouaced at Jonathan’s house south of Leiper’s Fork and got a ride back into town.

The Harpeth Racing team huddles around the gas range for warmth

Now this particular ride would have been considerably more “epic” if we had chosen to continue, but most of us had endured enough of the epic (epic in this case equals rain) and wanted to go home and stand in a hot shower with a cold beverage.

 The season is young. There is much time remaining for suffering.

Read my full report of this ride here: http://www.nathanrtaylor.com/jonathan-saves-the-day/

Harpeth Racing’s own Todd Essig braved the cold and rain to race the 2010 edition of the North Georgia Adventure Race. Running for 30 continuous hours, race participants paddled, ran, and pedaled mountain bikes through the Chattahoochee National Forest in North Georgia. Todd submitted this race report after successfully completing the event on January 16-17th, 2010.

I raced this event with long time friends and teammates Chris Stark & Leslie Trussler. NGAR was a “supported race”, meaning that we had a support mini-van to haul our canoe and bikes and meet us at the designated Transition Areas for clothing changes, food, fuel etc. The opposite being unsupported races where you carry all you need for the duration of the event often with some “gear drops” along the way.

At 2pm the Friday before the race we arrived at the pre-race location for paper work and gear check, and picked up maps and instructions. We went to a local hotel and spent the next 3.5 hours plotting grid coordinates and doing route planning/strategy for the weekend.

The pre-race meeting was held at 6:45pm that night, then it was back to hotel. Early Saturday morning we loaded the van and drove to the race start at Carters Lake. The prologue start was a one mile run to spread out the teams along the course. At the end of the run we grabbed the team canoe and loaded all three persons into the boat (outfitted with a snap in middle seat). We were using carbon fiber wing blade paddles, making us a pretty fast team on water. The canoe portion was a 20 mile paddle around the lake. Our instructions were to find 5 designated flags on the shoreline, punch the passport at each and paddle like hell to the next one. We completed it in about 4 hours.

Back at the take out where we started, it was a quick change of socks, light clothing change, and onto the mountain bikes. We rode North a good 20+ miles and passed through Ft. Mountain State Park where we were allowed to see our support guy Emmitt Martin. Emmit is known in Nashville as the promoter of Run for the Party and Nashville’s half-Marathon.

At this point we picked up alot of food, fuel, water, clothing and running shoes knowing that we would not see any support for next 12+ hours. The three of us continued to bike north to Windy Gap Mtnbike trail head and dropped the bikes for the next leg. It was very dark at this point with rain coming down hard. We started hiking/jogging up the mountain to find 3 flags/checkpoints in the woods. We ran back to our bikes in sideways rain and 38 degrees, quite miserable conditions.  Everyone was soaking wet and very cold at this point, thankfully local race volunteers had cups of Ramen Noodles for all and that was a nice treat.

After putting on ALL of our available clothing we headed East by bike to Mulberry Gap Mountian Bike Retreat; this place is a must see and visit location. I cannot wait to go back! Mulberry Gap Mountain Bike Retreat was a checkpoint along the way and they had cookies, soup, and hot chocolate. Though it was nice to get out of rain we had to hurry and go back out into it.

Mulberry Gap Mountain Bike Get-A-Way is a mountain retreat located neear the small community of Ellijay, GA. Catering specifically to mountain bikers, Mulberry Gap is surrounded by the Chattahoochee National Forest, making it perfectly suited to enjoy a weekend of riding and hiking the more than 150 miles of trails.

For more information, visit http://www.mulberrygap.com or call 706-698-2865 (email preferred)

Biking East to the Pinhoti Trail, then North to Hwy. 52, we encountered terrain that required a lot of bike pushing. The rain making it too muddy and steep to ride. This continued for the remainder of the night. We would ride through the darkness, find another checkpoint, ride/push some more, and find more flags in woods. By dawn we returned to Fort Mountain Park.

At Fort Mountain we checked in, dropped our bikes, and took some time to thaw out,  change clothing and EAT. We were given 10 orienteering points to plot on a map. The objective of this leg was to go out and collect as many of these points as possible before the end of the race at 3 pm. This was an early season race for us and we had all spent more time at Christmas parties and on the couch than training so we were pretty gassed at this point. Still, we went out, colleccted 4 points and got back to the finish by 1.30pm where we called it a race.

We Placed 10th out of 38 teams, raced for 30 hours (non-stop) covering approximately 95 miles total through Chattahoochee National Forest. A pretty solid effort. We had clean navigation, no injuries, and lived to fight another day.

-Todd

An additional report of this race can be found here: http://checkpointzero.com/2010/01/ngar-the-toughest-race-in-georgia/

Jay Spiegel wrote a great followup to the last post on the team message board, so I am re-posting it here. -Nathan

Thanks to Nathan for a great report of our ride yesterday. I’d like to talk a bit about how we watch for each other at team rides. At one point Brad and John got separated by the group on Greenbrier headed toward N Lick Creek. Fortunately it was due to some miscommunication, and not a mechanical or anything like that. So in the end it wasn’t
a big deal.

We joked before the ride that since we are a race team, we don’t bother with cue sheets, and I am completely in favor of avoiding that hassle. (see video below for a funny explanation of why racers don’t use cue sheets. -Nathan)

Part of being a team is taking responsibility for everyone on the ride from the people pulling to the last person in the paceline. We are all responsible for communicating with one another, and knowing who is behind us at all times, and being aware of those who may fall off or get out of sight.

So, I’m asking everyone on the team to avoid passively going along for the ride, and maintaining awareness and practicing communication so that we either arrive together or if we arrive separately, it is planned that way. If you’re on the front, be aware of how your riding affects the group…keep it steady, avoid surges, keep your line straight. If you are in the group, ride steadily, and don’t let gaps develop. If you are on the back and you or someone next to you starts to fall off, let the people immediately in front of you know, and pass it on. Everyone should be aware of who is directly behind them. Also, if someone is off the back because of a turn or something, and you are on the back of the front group, drop back so that the people chasing can get in your draft and pull them up. At the same time, the
front group should ease off if someone is chasing. Unless it’s a race or simulation…

I’m looking forward to seeing everyone at the Belladium ride if weather permits.

-Jay

Les Wooldridge responded to this on the team message board with a key piece of wisdom:

Jay writes, “If you are on the back and you or someone next to you starts to fall off, let the people immediately in front of you know, and pass it on.”

This will be a challenge for some of you because you’ll think “Man, if I start to fall off the back, the team will think I’m slow, weak, fat, out of shape, blah blah blah…”

Much more important in this situation is safety and as Jay says, communication and responsibility. If someone is falling off, it will be very important for the team to make a decision on what to do with that opportunity. You will usually find that there are almost always some other riders at that time in the ride who want to back it down a notch and will be happy to ride in with you. It doesn’t mean everyone has to slow it down but a discussion should occur and a group decision made.

Lastly, let the person on our team who has never come off the back of a pack step forward… (let me assure all the newer riders that no one will step forward).
-Les

The team kits came in late last week from Louis Garneau, so we arranged for pick up on Saturday followed by a long endurance ride.

Temperatures were in the mid 30s by the time we were ready to roll at 10am. Our group was 17 strong. It was mostly guys from the team, but we also had some strength from Team Belladium, the newly formed women’s cycling team.  Brad had 3.5 hours of endurance pace riding planned, but no particular route, so we headed out Southwest of the shop on familiar roads.

17 people is a lot to manage in a contr0lled paceline, but we quickly fell into a comfortable rhythm.The level of experience of this group was varied, but generally high enough that close quarters riding was no problem.

We rode together at a comfortable pace out to the store at Burwood, where a small group split off to head back to Franklin. The rest of us continued on to more familiar roads near Leiper’s Fork.

By the second half of the ride temperatures had climbed into the 40s, which gave ride to a few harder efforts. Mark rode away from all of us by climbing Greenbrier in his big chainring. We regrouped and headed down Pinewood in a decent headwind. Mitch chased down a sprint attempt with me right on his wheel (I owe you one, Mitch). I was lucky to react to Mark’s second launch and caught him before we turned at the Shell station.

Brad and D-squad member John Wade had taken a different turn than us and we hadn’t reconnected with them by this point in the ride, so we all agreed to head back to the shop. Jay took the sprint at the Leiper’s Fork town sign.

Our 3.5 hour ride was quickly turning into a 4 hour ride and I was feeling it with every hill. Good thing for me that the last few miles to the shop were kept at a reasonable pace. We ended up with 67 miles of riding.

The new team kits look great, and the arm warmers and vests did a surprisingly good job keeping us warm in the low temps.

Harpeth Bicycles Racing team members Jonathan Woody and Nathan Taylor, and potential D-Squad member Gabrielle Woody participated in this year’s Lock 4 Six Hour Challenge on November 14th. The conditions couldn’t have been better for a race, especially compared to the rainy week preceding the original race date of September 5th. Sunny, cloudless skies, and temperatures quickly rising to 60 degrees made it easy to get motivated for this event.

Jonathan, Gabrielle, and I registered as a 3 person relay team, as it was our first race and we weren’t sure what to expect. Our plan was to have me do the Le Mans start and first lap, followed by Jonathan, and then Gabrielle. This would give us each at least two laps on the 9 mile loop.

My first lap time was 58:45. The trail was smooth and fast with a layer of fallen leaves that was quickly being mulched into dust by all the racers. I exceeded my threshold a few times on the short climbs near the lake and had to slow to let some of the faster racers pass.

Jonathan’s first lap was 53:05. He had both of our fastest laps of the day and definitely held the position of anchor for our team.

Gabrielle officially turned a 1:02:44 for her first lap, but Jonathan and I waited too long at the pit area before going to look for her, so we missed her at the Airplane Field Trailhead. Once we realized that she had already gone past, we relocated to the road crossing and waited there. A few minutes later we got word that she had finished her lap, couldn’t find her team, and started a second lap! Luckily, we were able to find her only a half a mile or so inside the trail and make a trailside relay transition.

My second lap time was 1:05:24, which included all of the time that we wasted by botching the transition. I took it easier on the short climbs so I didn’t spike my heart rate, and felt a lot more consistent throughout. By this point in the race the “fast” line was clearly visible through the leaves.

Jonathan pulled a 50:28 minute lap for his second. Every time we saw him at one of the traileads, he was cranking hard and not looking up. He pushed the last section of trail fairly hard and almost overcooked the dry turn into the trail following the first road crossing.

Gabrielle and I waited at the transition area so we didn’t miss Jonathan and it was clear that he was done after this second lap.

Gabrielle finished out our sixth lap of the day with a 1:05:29 time. She crossed under the inflatable Red Bull banner with five minutes to spare!

Our cumulative time and lap count (6) was good enough for second out of fourth place in the 3-person “Just Having Fun” category. Racing two laps each (Close to 19 miles) didn’t seem like much when compared to the 8 laps that some of the solo racers were able to turn, but it was enough that I felt it the next day.

Additional race day photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nathanrtaylor/sets/72157622693747411/

Guys:

If you have not already done so, I would like to put in my $0.02 regarding bike fit.

The shop has a precision Serotta fit bike connected to a computrainer. No doubt you have noticed it.

Those of us who have been with the shop and/or team for a while can attest to the effectiveness of a perfect fit on the bike.

Before my first bike was adjusted according to the fit process I went through, I experienced some back and shoulder pain on a regular basis…riding long was no fun. Riding fast…well an 18 mph average on a 40 mile ride in a group was unheard of. I was always off the back on club rides.

After my fit, I was instantly more comfortable. My leg muscles took a week or two to adjust, and I was immediately faster…immediately. Did I say immediately. Yes, I think I did.

Since then, I have been on two different Serotta frames, and have been refit a couple of times to account for some weight loss and extra agility from cross training.

I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that if you have not been through this process and you want to get faster and more comfortable on the bike, that this is THE single best thing you can do. You can get the lightest components and coolest wheels, and those things wont make a dramatic improvement.

On my regular 18 mile training loop, I did good to average 17 solo before. Now, I can average 20 solo on a good day. I have a little more fitness now than I did then, but that is almost an 18% improvement. Now, if I am smart in a peleton, in a road race, my average is usually 22-23.

Ask anyone who has been through the process…especially one like me who was improperly fit by the previous shop I used.

If you are interested, check with any of the guys at the shop for details.

End of pitch…

Jay

This is the final design for our 2010 Harpeth Bicycles Racing Team kit supplied by Louis Garneau.

It’s a great looking design, very classic.

17 people left Hunter’s Bend Elementary Sunday morning for 40+ miles of easy winter riding. Two of the riders, Stephanie and Olga, rode fixed gear and were fast enough that most of the other riders didn’t notice anything different about their riding until we made the first stop at the Davis Store.

The weather was perfect. Bright sun, some wind, and 50 degrees. Jay did a great job putting the route together. Click here for route info.