24

Summer of 2009 has been a wild one and this weekend its gonna get a little wilder down in Canmore. Having done a 24 hr solo event last yr I am pretty stoked to get back there for a epic ride in the mtns with a bunch of crazy guys from around the world.

Thanks Summer for the last minute training and the great week of riding around Vancouver Island!

Congrats Jana and Kent on your wedding!



The 24 hr race can be followed live starting saturday at noon on:

http://24wsc.com/

and

http://twitter.com/WSC24

Crazy Days

Racing in Colorado has been quite the journey with results going from 9th, 40th, 4th, 24th and then 4th again. Like many of the racers down here we are at the mercy of our bodies as we can;t seem to figure out what makes them tick up here in the altitude. Apart from the racing we have been chasing down our tents as they've blown all over the baseball field, putting rocks on the sprinkler heads to prevent the confusion of how our tents keep getting drenched on sunny days and fixing flat tires as the rocks down here are hungry. Having various results has been pretty cool as you get a chance to ride with different people everyday. I must admit though when a single speed dude caught me on day 2 I was getting ready to take up a new sport but then riding behing Bishop and Brown the next day lifted my spirits. After tommorows final stage it will be time for some smooth riding as this event has tossed us all on quite the roller coaster ride.

Colorado

The voyage down to Kananaskis and back was pretty wicked. The icefields parkway is great for riding as there are slow moving motorhomes all over the place to draft behind and pretty wicked mtns all along the way not to mention the 5 hostals which allows a biker to travel pretty light. The race in k- country went alright but 170 lbs is too much for a mtn biker to climb up hills with when there's flying dutchmen (Tim Heemskerk) on the start line.

In another effort to jump start the season I hopped a plane to Colorado to take on the 6 day Breck Epic SR (http://www.breckepic.com/). Stage 1 was a 5 mile prologue which blew my lungs apart. Stage 2 was a smooth 40 mile loop up to 12 00o ft. Going out hard with the 6 leaders up the first 7 km climb I soon blew up like the fireworks down here on the 4th of july and began pedaling backwards. 20 minutes later I started pedaling forwards again but then my wheels started mimicking the 4th of july and 3 blown flats later I slowly crawled across the finish line in a millionth place. Riding down here is not easy as the whole course is above 9 800 ft and when there's aclimatized racers like Jeremiah Bishop and Travis Brown leading the way the pace is not slow. My lungs are blown, the legs are still warped from planting and the pain threshold is growing through each pedal stroke. I have never raced before in the USA but I must say some of the singletrack is alright although the green money is lame and being forced to carry a rain jacket in a race is a good sign your not up in Canada with the lumberjacks.

Throughout the Breckepic I will be doing reports for sleepmonsters at www.sleepmonsters.com.