One of the traditional rides on Thanksgiving morning is to make the 19 mile climb up Mt. Hamilton. There were two separate club rides up the hill that day, but I wanted an extra challenge so I joined in the race sponsored by the Low Key Hill Climb series.  Not exactly “low key”, but neither a sanctioned race.

Starting near sea level, the finish is at over 4,000 feet, the highest elevation for any local climb.  At the top there is the famous Mt. Hamilton Observatory.  With a maximum grade of about 6%, the road leading up is never real steep.  To allow the movement of the heavy equipment to build the observatory many years ago, they had to keep the grade from being too excessive.  Still, with over 18 miles of racing, mostly all up hill, it is a challenge indeed.

There was a very large turnout for the race, the most I have seen at any Low Key Hill Climb race.  I arrived around 8:30 when registration was open and we all started soon after 9:30 am.  The temperature had warmed up by then so I took off my jacket before the start and carried it for the later descent.  I started a ways back in the pack of about 200 cyclists, not wanting to get in the way of the real fast riders.  That was a bit of a mistake because I had to go around a lot of riders in the first half mile.  But soon I settled down to a fast, but constant rhythm.  I noted that my heart rate was hovering around 170 and I started to worry that maybe I was burning myself up.  This is above my Lactate Threshold so I would not be able to hold this for the 90 plus minutes of the race.  But I felt fine so I kept holding the pace and  continued to pass a few more riders.

There are two short down hill sections on the course, which allowed for some recovery.

photo by Adam Tow

When I was within 3 miles of the finish, I was surprised I had been able to not only keep my heart rate up, but was feeling strong enough to pickup the pace further and start to pace some additional riders who seemed to be suffering from the effect of the long climb.

I crossed the finish line at the parking lot of the Observatory with a total time of 96:46.  This is a bit less than my official time of 97:03 because I did not start my watch until I reached the intersection while the front of the pact was actually positioned beyond that point when the official clock started.  Although this was not my very best time, it was a minute faster than the same race last year, so I was happy with that.

When I returned home and downloaded the data from my heart rate monitor I was surprised that for the entire climb I averaged a heart rate of 168, including the downhill sections.  That means my Lactate Threshold is something above that, which is remarkable for someone nearly 62 years old.  My maximum heart rate during the climb was 176, close to my max heart rate. You can see this on this graph (click to enlarge).

When they posted the results I was 86th place out of 152 men and  it appears I had the fastest time for anyone over 60 years of age.  It is a bit difficult to be sure because this is a low key event and some people make up their own categories, but most use something related to their age.  They have a scoring system where you get some percentage of the median time.  For this race I got a score of 97.80 since I was slightly slower than the median male rider.  When I did the Montebello hill climb race last month, and set a new PR, I scored a 102.15.

My biking is not quite up to last year’s level in either total miles or feet of climbing.  Last year in the fall I did both the Everest Challenge and the Furnace Creek 508 races so I didn’t think I would do as well this year on the Mt. Hamilton race.  Even being a year older and with fewer feet of climbing, I still shaved over a minute off my time from last year.

It was a fun event.  I was surprised I was able to hold my heart rate at such a high level for so long.  I think I might have been able to push even harder but it was Thanksgiving and I wanted to have energy left to eat that big meal.  Since I burned over 1,600 calories on the race, I had no guilt eating that afternoon.

Categories: Cycling Racing
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I have a few major things on my bucket list that I checked off in the last few years, but one that I had not yet accomplished was to ride the Moab White Rim Trail in a single day. I have ridden it before but in 3 days so  I knew that although the trail is not that technical, with over 100 miles with no water sources, over 6,000 feet of climbing, sand, and pounding from the terrain, finishing it in a single day makes it a monster ride.

A couple of weeks ago my brother Mike called and let me know they were going to attempt to do the White Rim Trail in a day and thought they would have a spot for me. I knew my friend Jim would also be interested so I checked if there was a spot for him, which became available. It was short notice and no time to do much training on the mountain bike so it was relying on my road bike training. I figured I had a fairly good chance of finishing but was not fully confident. There was going to be a vehicle to follow the riders to carry water and food, and provide the only bail out if someone could not make it.

On Thursday Jim and I made the long drive from California up to our second home in Orem, Utah. On Friday afternoon, Mike came by to pick us up for the drive to Moab.  Mike and Stu’s bike were in the bed so we loaded Jim and my bike on a rear mounted rack.

It was dark by the time we arrived in Moab.  The four of us checked into the motel and then met Rian, Vint and Jack who had driven from Colorado.  Jack had offered to drive Mike’s truck along the route and be our support vehicle, supporting the 6 riders (2  from California, 2 from Utah and 2 from Colorado).  We decided at dinner to leave in the morning at 5 am.  First stop was Denny’s, the only place open at that time to get some breakfast.

From Moab it is a 30 mile drive out to the White Rim Trail.  The trail itself does not form a complete loop so there is a section of connecting the two ends of the trail with 14 miles on a dirt road and then about 7 miles on a paved road.  Some people do the White Rim in a Day by skipping these miles, having someone shuttle them, but we wanted to do the entire loop and finish where we started.  We drove the 14 miles out on the dirt road and parked at the top of the Horsetheif Trail Climb.  Our biking route would then be going back on the 14 miles of dirt road to the highway.

Our plan was to start biking around 7 am, just before civil twilight.  After getting a group shot we started at 7:15 am.

It was now barely light enough to start without a light.  We rode the 14 mile dirt road section back to the highway and ended up with 1,600 feet of climbing.  The sun was now fully up so we decided to take off some of the clothing and put it in the truck.  That stop cost us 7 minutes.  It had been decided earlier to send the truck ahead at this point so it could get down Shafer Trail before we did since we could descend faster than the truck.  We biked another 7 miles on the paved highway to the park entrance where we had to stop and pay the entrance fee.  There was no one manning the entrance booth to take the fee and we didn’t want to bike an extra 2 miles to the visitor center to pay it.  Luckily we noticed a drop box we could put in our $5 each in an envelope.  Soon after the entrance we made a left turn and headed down Shafer Trail.  This is my least favorite part of the White Rim Trail.  It is very rocky and a relatively long steep descent.  On some sections, if you went off the trail, you would fall down 500 feet because it is cut into a cliff.

When we reached the bottom at 7:43 am there was no truck.  Evidently Jack had not noticed the drop box and had driven over to the visitor center to pay the entrance fee.   While waiting I took a few pictures of the riders.

After the truck arrived we topped off our water and headed out, for a total stopping time of 18 minutes at that spot.  Vint and Rian went out ahead, and Mike and Stu were falling behind Jim and I.  Jim was riding next to me.  Just as soon as he made a comment to me that my mountain biking skills had improved, he hit a bump that knocked one hand off his handlebar and he was headed off the trail.  He was able to recover just in time.  I thought it would have made a better story if he had taken a fall, but with a trail of rocks and slickrock, no one wanted to fall on this ride.

At 34 miles into the ride we came upon Rian, who had stopped to wait.  While waiting, Jim was checking his tires and realized the rear was too low of a pressure.  It seemed like a good spot to wait for the other riders and the truck.

We were not quite sure what happened and it was 15 minutes before they showed up.  I guess Jack was having a hard time driving the truck to keep up with the bikers so Mike was holding back.  Jim pumped his tire with the floor pump from the truck and we were off, with a total stop of 18 minutes.  Rian had estimated that we needed to average 10.5 mph and stop a total of 90 minutes, or we would not finish without lights.  But we had now used up half of our total allocated 90 minutes stopping time and had only gone 17 miles from the start going down Shafer Trail.  We clearly needed to pick up the pace and keep any more stopping to a minimum.

Our next stop was at mile 43 and we were off within 6 minutes.  We had some periodic stops along the way and were doing similar quick stops.  Keeping up a fast steady pace and short stops left little time to take any pictures but I was able to grab a few at some of the stops.

At White Crack (1:24 pm and mile 58), we did take a bit longer break.  With 11 minutes I was able to gobble down a PB&J sandwich and drink a diet coke.  After another 2 hours we finally reached Murphy (2:15 pm and 65 miles).   I knew from past experience that this was one of the hills I would not be able to climb so I got off my bike at the bottom and started to walk up.  It allowed me to grab one picture of Rian who was making it up the hill.

After another short stop at the top of Murphy we continued on.  Mike had promised me no more climbing before the last climb so I kept saying, “hey I would call this a climb” every time we had to go up.

Actually we had some real serious climbing up Hardscrable (87 miles and 4:45 pm).  This section proved too difficult for me so I was walking part of the climbs but Rian and some others were motoring up them.  I could never figure how someone could climb such steep grades with rocks and loose dirt.  It was amazing to watch.

We now started our descend down to the Green River.  I recall last year this section had a lot of sand that I had to walk through this year I was able to stay on the bike.  I could see several vehicles stopped on the road ahead.  Some group, headed in the opposite direction as we were going, had got stuck trying to pull a loaded trailer with a truck that just had street tires on it.  Cars had been stopped behind it.  This is a steep section and no room for a vehicle to go around and it was difficult enough just to get my bike around the congestion.  They kept trying to put some rocks under the truck tires to get traction but were failing.  I decided to bike on down where I saw Vint waiting.  It was now 5:16 pm and I was running out of daylight so Jim and I decided to go ahead.  But that meant we could not retrieve any water or food, or even our lights, from the support vehicle.  I had enough water and hoped we could make it before dark.  Vint said he was going to wait for a short while to see if they freed the road, then catch us.

Finally we reached my favorite part of the trail, along the Green river.  Jim was not feeling that great so we made one stop to take on some more food.   While we were waiting Vint and Rian joined us  and told us that the trailer had finally got freed so it should not be too long before our support vehicle could continue on.  We all continued along together.  Rian’s bottom bracket was making a real racket so I was not sure he would be able to make it.  At last, at 6:13 pm we made it to the bottom of the final climb up Horsethief Trail.  We had figured that we could bike without lights until 7 pm so I knew that I had plenty of time to make the climb.  I was feeling fine enough so I went ahead and reached the parking lot at 6:35 pm, with plenty of time to spare before it was too dark to bike without a light.  It was a great feeling to finish such an epic ride.

I grabbed my camera and took some pictures of the other riders as they finished right behind me.

It was getting cold now.  Luckily I had kept a jacket in my Camelbak but that was not enough.  Rian and Vint had both parked their cars at the top, but both had left their keys in the support vehicle. Fortunately Rian had a keypad so we could get in his car, out of the wind.  Another gal was also parked there, waiting for her group who had also been doing the White Rim in a day.  Some time passed and no sign of Mike and Stu or any of the riders she was waiting for.  One of the riders from the other group finally came in and gave us an update that although the trailer had been freed, it got stuck again.  I figured Mike had stayed back to watch his truck and would not leave until it had got through.  We were not sure how long it was going to be now.  Finally a second rider from the other group arrived and let us know that the trailer had finally cleared the climb.  At 7:48 pm Mike and Stu arrived, wearing headlamps.  Right behind them was the support vehicle.

It turned out to be ideal conditions.  Although this time of the year meant less sunlight, the temperature was just about right for such a long ride.  I had a fantastic time and the group of guys I was riding with made it extra special.

Later I downloaded the data from my Polar heart rate monitor.  I had to adjust my distances because I didn’t have things set right for my mountain bike so I was reading 7% low on the distance.  Mike got around 100 miles on his Garmin GPS so I used that as the total distance and adjusted things accordingly.  Here is a elevation profile and some other data. Click the chart to view enlarged.

Date: 10/24/09
Distance: 100 miles
Climbing: 6,600 feet
Average Heart Rate: 132
Maximum Heart Rate: 169 (93% of Max HR)
Average Speed (rolling): 10.5 mph
Total Time: 11:20
Stopping Time: 1:50

Categories: Mountain Biking
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I joined the Low Key Hill Climb race today up Montebello.  This hill is about 5.3 miles in length and a climb of 1,980 feet with an average grade of about 7%.    I was able to take nearly 5 minutes off my best previous time set last year.  My final time was about 34:25.

Franz At Finish - photo by Calvin Do

I kept my heart rate high the entire climb with an average of 168 and a maximum of 174.  After the initial ramp-up, I keep it in the red zone for the whole climb, as you can see below (click graph to view enlarged).

Categories: Cycling Racing
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Last post was 3rd time is NOT the charm because I was not able to set a PR on Alpine Loop after setting a new one on two other hills in the same week.  Our stay is drawing to a close so I am anxious to try to get some new best times up some of the local hills here after putting a new compact crank on my bike and after getting a new lighter new frame (under warranty).

About two weeks ago I did the 1000 Warriors race and had terrible cramping on the final climb up Snowbird.  I usually only get to climb this hill after a lot of biking in terms of distance and climbing.  Since Anne needed to return something to a store in Salt Lake I thought this was a good time to do the usual bike route in reverse so I had her drop me off on Wasatch Blvd.

I figured I could set a new best time up Snowbird since I would not have that many miles on my legs before I started.  I am proud to say I was not passed by any other cyclist this time and I passed everyone in sight (an old guy on a recumbent and another ld guy on a mountain bike).  I ended up with a time that was about 8 minutes faster than my prior best time I did on a training ride.

After descending back down I rode the 1000 Warriors route in reverse until I reached the bottom of Transverse Ridge (the north side of Suncrest).  If thought maybe I could set a new PR on this hill also so I took my heart rate up to a rather high level and kept it there for the entire climb.  I was able to take three minutes off my prior best time.

I was feeling rather tired and was tempted to ride back home the flat way.  But after making a brief stop to get some more liquid in me (it was hot in the low 90’s) I decided to stick with my original plan and go up American Fork Canyon, then down the Alpine Loop.  As I started the climb, I was feeling in pretty good shape and decided to give it a go to see if I could sent a 3rd PR for the day, something I have never been able to do before.  I passed a couple of riders I recognized that had the “Ride for a Reason” jersey on.  One joined me for awhile but when I answered his question that it was 3 miles to the summit, he backed off to join his friend.  I was checking the time on the mile markers and about 1.5 miles from the top I knew I would be able to set a new record time.  I ended up taking another 2 minutes off.  So with the 3 new PRs I collectively took 13 minutes off, which I was very happy about.

It was getting a bit cool as I started to descend down the Alpine Loop.  I am sure that the temperature was high enough but after pushing my body so hard on three tough climbs, I guess I should have stopped and rested.  I did decide to take it easy going down.  About 6 miles from home I had a flat on the rear tire.  Normally  would have been frustrated to flat so close to home but I was so happy with my riding that I just took it in stride.

Here is all the data.  You will see that my LT has moved up from my training because I was able to sustain heart rates over 165 bpm for almost an hour.  Before I would have been cooked if I tried that.  My maximum heart rate for the day was 177, so I guess my maximum heart rate is still around 180.  I am not quite sure why I ever let my heart rate go to 177, I guess I got excited near the top of Transverse Ridge with my time.

Here is my heart rate chart. You can see I went into the red zone on many of the climbs, especially on Transverse Ridge.  Click to enlarge.

Categories: Cycling, Training Log
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I have been feeling light on the bike lately, setting new PR records up Suncrest and Squaw Peak in the last week. I decided to give it a shot to set a new PR going up the Alpine Loop. Actually I was headed over the mountain, then up Suncrest, before meeting Anne for the regularly scheduled Utah Velo ride. I ended up with a total of 72 miles today, that coupled with going all out yesterday to set a new Squaw Peak PR, I guess I just didn’t have quite enough left on the Alpine Loop. But I did get my best time this year.  I kept my heart rate between 158 and 162 for most of the climb, but did take it into the 170’s for the last 1.5 miles.

Categories: Cycling, Training Log
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Yesterday I wrote about putting a compact crank on my road bike.  Today I changed the gearing on Anne’s road bike so she would also have lower gearing.  She already had a triple crank with a 12-27 cassette so the only way to get lower gearing would be to add a mountain bike type cassette on the rear, which means also the need to change to a mountain bike rear derailleur.  There was one complication because Anne had 10 speed shifters on her bike and all mountain bike components are 9 speed.

You can not just use a 9 speed cassette with 10 speed shifters because the cable pull between gears is different.  When I bought my new compact crank for my bike, I also purchased an XTR rear derailleur because it was also on sale at Performance and there was also a 12 hour period with 20% more off.  Cost for the XTR was only $80, a steal.  From my prior experience I knew that I needed a “top normal” type.  Newer mountain bikes use a “low normal”.  Derailleurs are defined by the normal position of the derailleur (that is the resting position), either the top gear (smallest cog) or the lowest gear.

I checked with the bike club for recommendations.  Most of those responded recommend using an IRD product. They make a 10 speed 11-34 cassette.  I was not too anxious with this approach for a couple of reasons.  First I had tried that cassette, on loan from a friend, on my road bike before last year’s Everest Challenge.  I was not happy with how it shifted so I took it off and did the event last year with my double crank and regular road cassette.  Second the price for this cassette is about $170, which is a lot more than a Shimano XT cassette that would shift better.

When you have a triple crank having 10 speeds is a bit overkill because you get a lot of duplication in gearing.  I feel that most people with a triple who also want mountain bike gearing would have been happy to stay with 9 speeds but Shimano didn’t go that route with their road components.  There is talk that they will come out with a 10 speed mountain bike group, but that is not yet the case.

One club member suggested I look at a product from Jteck Engineering, called the ShiftMate.  I emailed the company and got a reply to my questions within an hour.  After studying the concept, it seemed like a great way to go so I ordered online from them, cost of $35 plus $6 shipping.  They shipped to me by priority mail.

This device is two concentric pulleys that the derailleur cable routes around.  The difference in the diameter of the two pulleys is such that the cable pull from the 10 speed shifters is increased to match what the cable pull from 9 speed shifters would do.  This allows you to use a 9 speed cassette.  The device arrived last Saturday.   I took a look and it seemed to be a clever approach to a common issue.

Today I decided to tackle this project.  I started by removing the cable from the existing Shimano 105 rear derailleur.

Next I removed the chain from the bike.

After I removed the existing 10 speed derailleur, I attached the new XTR derailleur in it’s place.

I cut the cable housing shorter so it would fit better, then threaded the cable back through the housing and then through the ShiftMate.

Next I removed the road cassette from the rear wheel and replaced it with a Shimano 11-34 cassette.  I had purchased a new XT cassette for our tandem during the recent sale but was not planning to use that until later this year.  Since we use our tandem more than Anne uses her single bike, I decided to do a swap and put the new cassette and chain on the tandem and move the tandem’s rear cassette and chain over to Anne’s bike.

The final step was to connect the cable to the rear derailleur and make the final adjustments.  Since the shifter has 10 stops and the cassette has only 9, I used the low stop on the derailleur.

A short test ride on the street showed that things were shifting smoothly, just as you would expect if the bike had 9 speed shifters.  Since I used some components from our tandem, the total cost was only $80 for the XTR and $35 for the Shiftmate, for a total of $115.  If Shimano does come out with a 10 speed 11/34 cassette, I can always switch to that and most of my investment will still be used.

Later in the day, we went for a ride to make sure that it shifted okay while actually climbing.  Anne reported that it worked just fine.

Categories: Cycling Equipment
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After the experience of cramping going up Snowbird at the end of the 1000 Warriors race, I decided to order a new compact crank.  I had already put a SRAM 11-28 cassette on the rear and that was working, so I would be able to still get a fairly high gear (50/11) with a compact crank.  I was lucky because Performance had it on sale for almost 40% off retail and then there was a 12 hour extra 20% off coupon.  I bought it and a new XTR deraulier for Ann’s bike and had them delivered to our Utah home so no sales tax.

I decided to do the swap today. I first removed the existing Dura-Ace double crank by looseing the two bolts using an allen wrench.  I then removed the cap using a special Park tool.  You then flip up the plastic tab that keeps the crank from coming off, then pull off the fright crank arm.  I could see that I had a press fit bottom bracket that came with the new frame.  Since this was brand new, there was no reason to replace it.  I pulled the crank assemble out of the bottom bracket and reversed the procedure.  I could not get the plastic lock stop to engage properly so I thought maybe my crank arm was no in all the way.  Finally I swapped the plastic tab with the one from my double crank and it worked just fine.

I had to move the front derailuer down a bit but my new frame has a clamp-on type so that was easy enough to do.  My frame that ended up breaking had a brazed on derailleur and I was always worried about the amount of adjustment.

I realized I also need to also shorten the chain.  The prior chrankset was 53/39 and the new compact is 50/34.  So the large chainring has 3 teeth less and the small chainring has 5 teeth less.  The chain goes around slightly more than 50% of the chainring,  So for the large chainring that means 3 * .5 = 1.5 links and with the small chaingring 5*.05= 2.5 links.  You can only remove links in multiple of two so I took out two links and checked the chain when it was cross chained in both directions.

So how much lower gear will I get?  The compact crank with a 11/28 cassette gives you the range of a stock triple since 53/12 is about the same as 50/11 on the high end and 34/28 is about the same as 30/25 on the low end.  Of course it will not be as low a gear as a triple with a 27 or 28 tooth cassette.

My next project is to add mountain bike gearing to Anne’s single bike.  On the same order with the Dura-Ace compact crank, I ordered a Shimano XTR rear derailleur that was also on sale.  But she has 10 speed shifters and most mountain bike cassettes are 9 speed.  I had to either get a special 3rd party 10 speed cassette or try a device that changes the cable pull.  I decided to try the later.  But that is the subject for another blog entry.

Categories: Cycling Equipment
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John and I competed in the 95 mile, 1000 Warriors race that covered the very tough course of stage 4 of the Tour of Utah.  I had done the same race last year.  This year they had more than twice as many riders and it was a USAC sanctioned race.

Anne was kind enough to provide support for myself and John.  That involved  driving us to the start and meeting us at some hand off places along the route.  We had to get up early and were in the car by 5 am.  John’s start time was 6:10 and it was still dark when he was getting ready to head to the start line.

I started with the Masters 55+ group at 6:45 am. It was now getting light.

As soon as we lined up I could see that there were several serious racers there, with $2000 racing wheels and PowerTap meters.   18 of us started right on time at 6:45 am.

There is a short climb in less than 2 miles and the group seemed to be off to a slow start so I went to the lead.  I thought that would be easy.  But they were just warming up and then we went to a fast descent and my speed reached 43.5 mph just staying in contact with about 6 other riders who had now split off from the rest of the group.

We then went into the second climb, not a significant grade, but still about 700 feet of climbing.  I was staying with the other 6 riders, one of them started to fall off the back.  My heart rate was creeping up and I made the first mistake of the day by letting my heart rate go to 174 in a vain attempt to stay connected.  Since we were near the summit I kept pushing hard but finally decided I was just setting myself up for failure later in the day so I fell off the back.  After cresting the summit the rider that was behind came down fast and I got on his wheel as he was trying to catch the riders ahead.  My speed got up to 45 mph until some sense came to me.  Why was I going down a hill with a heart rate of 160 bpm?

I was now riding solo through Kamas then down by the Jordanale  Reservoir.  On the last series of climbs before descending to Midway a big group of riders came by me and I jumped on the back.  By now John was already reaching Midway.

I was about to stay with 3 other riders to Midway.  When I reached Midway my average speed was 21. 7 mph, a bit faster than last year.

After a very quick stop to get more water (although I had not drank very much) I headed toward highway 189.  This is a busy road so I wanted to ride with others.  I could see one other rider far ahead and I pushed hard to catch up, maybe yet another mistake.  I finally caught him after we were on the highway and he was one who had started with me.   About half way on the busy highway, a large group of riders came by and we got a easier ride down to the Alpine Loop.  I reached the start of the climb with an average speed since Midway of 22.2 mph, better than last year’s 21.5.

I was feeling that I had been pushing too hard so I decided to back off on the climb up Alpine.  It took me only one minute longer than last year but looking at the data showed my average heart rate on the climb was 160, a bit high.

I watched my speed on the descent and was amazed at how fast some of the riders were coming down past me.  I didn’t want to take those type of risks.  When I reached the Timp Cave headquarters, they were motioning us to slow down.  The traffic had stopped ahead.  We slowly went into the other lane and rode down past about 2 miles of stopped cars with no cars coming up the canyon.  We finally reached the site of a serious cycling accident that involved 5 cyclists and a SUV.  The seriously injured riders were already gone in an ambulance but it was still a frightful feeling.

After carrying our bikes over the glass at the scene of the accident we biked down to the mouth of the canyon where they had stopped all the riders.  The highway patrol was letting groups of about 30 go at a time. I had some delay there but eventually was on my way.  I got to the feed zone and Anne told me that John had mentioned the accident.  I was glad to hear he was not involved.  Later John told me he reached the accident soon after it happened and the seriously injured cyclists was laying on the group in a pool of blood. According to the news reports, the injured rider broke every bone in his face…

I made the climb up Suncrest about 1 minute faster than last year.  I should have been backing off a bit and more focused on hydration.  When I met Anne at the feed zone on Wasatch, I did take the time to grab a half a PBJ and a banana but I started to ride and eat them on the bike.  It was now getting very warm and I was not drinking as well as I should have been.

I reached the start of the climb up Snowbird, now 11 minutes ahead of last year’s race.  I was figuring I would make the climb as fast as last year so I would do better overall.  As the grade started to increase I felt I needed to drink more but the grade, the heat and having only a double crank made it difficult to reach down to drink.  I could feel some cramping start in my left leg and I was getting worried.  I finally decided to make a quick stop to drink more water and take some endurolytes.  That was a mistake because as soon as I stopped major cramping set into both legs, so significant I could not move due to the pain.  It was too late to be able to ride easily up the hill.  After a few minutes, I made it back on the bike for about a mile, then I had to stop due to the pain.  Then back on the bike for awhile, then stop.  The pain was so great now that I had no choice but to walk because every attempt to get back on the bike was so painful I could not even get started.   I knew that Anne might be worried  since I was taking so long.  I had left my phone in the car so I could not call her.  All I could do was to keep moving.   I ended up walking over a mile until the grade started to ease up and I was able to get back on the bike by starting into the center of the road and riding toward the edge, allowing my legs to get going before starting the climb.  I rode the last mile to the finish.  I figured it took me an extra 35 minutes on the climb due to cramping.

John had finished long before me but it turned out he also had cramping.  I guess there were several that did because when I was walking my bike I saw many others do the same.  Last year I had a great climb up Snowbird but it was a terrible experience this year.  I was stupid because I know better to hydrate more and take sufficient endurolytes before I need to.  Still I was glad I was able to finally get back on the bike and not need to walk across the finish line.  When I was cramping one rider in our group passed me.  He finished in 6:18 and came in 8th place.  I probably would have been ahead of him without the cramping.  I ended up coming in 12th place.  This was one race I was very happy to finish.

Franz after finishing race

We then waited for awhile to watch the pros come in.

Anne and John

The first pro came across in 4:07.

Stage winner Alex Howes

Here are our time splits and how they compared with last year.

The table and graphs below are from the Polar HRM for both myself and John.  You can see that while John avoided spending too much time in the red zone.  I was in that zone too much for this year’s race.  The faster time I was obtaining to the base of Snowbird was coming at a high price.  The heart rate zones are based on the maximum and resting heart rate using this calculator.

Categories: Warrirors Race TofU
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It is now only one day before the 1000 Warriors race.  Tomorrow morning Anne will be driving John and I up to Park City for the race start.  We will need to leave here at 5 am.  Anne will be providing support at the feed zones but will not be following us on the course.

Every time I approach a big climbing even, I am always concerned about my weight.  There are two ways to climb faster, reduce the weight (of the rider or the bike) or output more power. Being 61 years old I am not sure I can output much more power. My bike is about as light as it is going to be without spending a lot more money. So I can only work on my body weight. Training has helped and I am now down to 138.5 lbs (63 kg). So there is nothing left to do but pray.

We are close enough that the weather forecast is getting to be accurate.  Rain is no longer in the forecast, which is a good thing.  But instead we are going to have hot weather.  Last year at the start it was 42 degrees, rather cold.  Tomorrow it should be around 58 degrees at the start.  That is nice biking weather, but the climb up Snowbird is going to be a cooker.  I start up Wasatch around 11:00 am, and it should be in the high 80’s.  The climb up Snowbird will be in the mid 90’s.  I hope it cools a bit as we climb to a higher elevation.

Training a few days before a race does not provide any benefit and may cause more harm if you get injured or too tired. So we all try to taper down but that is not much fun.  I really finished my last real training ride on Tuesday, although Anne and I did go out for a 25 mile ride yesterday (Thursday).  She beat me up South Fork by over 4 minutes, because I was determined to take it easy.  Some pains in my Achilles tendon today makes me think maybe I should not even have done that easy ride.

Looking at my training log, I see my mileage over the past 8 to 9 weeks has been quite similar to last year before the same race.

The feet of climbing per week shows a different story.  Part of this was due to traveling to Washington state where it was just flat riding and part was focusing on getting Anne ready for the Ulcer flat century.  My climbing was not at the same pace as last year, except in the last couple of weeks were I nearly caught up.  I am not sure if more climbing toward the end will be better than if it were spaced over several weeks.  We will see tomorrow.  Week 9 is this week and I have included in tomorrow’s ride.

Categories: Warrirors Race TofU
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This year’s Tour of Utah should be the best yet, with 6 stages and contenders including David Zabriskie, Floyd Landis and Tour veterans Oscar Sevilla and Francisco Mancebo.  As part of the pro racing, there are some events that are open to amateur racers.  One is the 1000 Warriors, a USA Cycling certified race, where over 600 racers will compete in stage 4, which starts in Park City Utah and has a hill top finish at Snowbird ski resort.   Riding in the event will be guest wounded warriors, purple heart recipients from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

I did a similar event last year with nearly the same course.  This year John will be flying in from Atlanta to join.  Here is the best current estimate for both myself and John to reach each point.  My estimate is based on doing the same as last year and as confirmed by recent training rides where I completed the entire course on two different days.  Since John will be starting 35 minutes before I do and will be riding faster, the gap between when we arrive at the SAG stops will increase.  Anne may not have time between after I arrive at the last hand off to drive to Snowbird and park before John finishes.  For this day, civil twilight is 6:15 am and sunrise at 6:44 am.  Last year I started at 5:53 am and it was dark.  That made it a bit spooky on the first descent where I reached speeds of 41 mph.

This shows the elevation profile. The steepest grade is 9% but you can see that the Snowbird climb is at around 9% for several miles (click graph to enlarge).

Here is the race route. The pros start at 11 am will finish around 3 pm.

Categories: Cycling Racing, Warrirors Race TofU
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