2018 was an interesting year of racing for me, I learned a lot and seemingly years of racing good fortune finally caught up to me as I had multiple mechanical and nutritional breakdowns. I was lucky enough to finish the year feeling strong and having a lot of fun, so really what else matters. After a pretty solid 2017, I was feeling good about how I was riding and where my fitness was. I had taken a little time off over the winter and my riding plans for 2018 would have me sticking largely to races and events that I was very familiar with and almost all of them were close to the house. The caveat to all of this is that we were set to have our 2nd child in August and Katie’s pregnancy didn’t really go as easily as the first had. Also, this is the first year I’ve really coming into a season with any sort of “expectations”.
The year started with Southern Cross down in Dahlonega, GA a gravel event that I do really enjoy however this year I started too hard, really didn’t do well with my fueling, then kind of fell apart about half way through the race. Which was a little disappointing but it was early in the year, I hadn’t really trained much before this, and I really wasn’t very familiar with racing on my geared gravel bike. On the bright side the weather was really good and I got to ride bikes with a lot of friends so it was a pretty good day.
The Pisgah Stage race went wrong about 20 minutes into the first stage with a broken rear axle. The rest of the week was just trying to claw back from that and then the week finished with a flat tire coming down the final descent that I ended up using 2 CO2 cartridges on and stopped 3 times to address while never really getting it straightened out (I was not putting a tube in it). The stage race was an amazingly fun week regardless of how things ended up. I wasn’t really happy with how I felt for the week so I started some conversations with a friend or two who have far more experience mountain bike racing than I do.
I really just wasn’t sure what direction to go, the “go ride your bike more” solution that I’ve done in the past wasn’t going to work as time is not something I have a lot of. Was I doing something wrong, why couldn’t I seem to feel good in race situations. After a few extremely helpful discussions with some much more experienced racers. I was pretty convinced that my main two issues that I could address without a major time or monetary investment were with fueling and pacing. As I’ve gotten faster and overall more fit I haven’t really kept up with the amount/type of fuel I need or how to pace. For a long time I’d gone with the go out hard and ride hard until things come apart and then hold on as best as possible….now I’m learning that I can go out a lot harder and when things come apart they come apart in a pretty spectacular fashion.
The next event PMBAR, is probably my favorite event of the year and the beginning of my main goal for the year, the King of Pisgah series. Riding this year with Wes from Sycamore. We had a great start and were rolling pretty good most of the day. At one point I started losing steam and then I just kind of ran out of gas. So we made the decision to skip the extra check point and finish with 4 of them. We were the first team in by a little while and our effort was still good enough for 4th overall. Which really wasn’t bad and we did have a pretty good time doing it.
Going into the 111k/55k weekend I was ready to try out some new nutrition tactics which was a step in the right direction but with really tough conditions I really couldn’t get things going all that well in either race. In the 111K with good intentions and a new nutrition plan I still went out a little harder than I needed to and something I was trying to eat didn’t agree with my stomach as I fought through some major stomach discomfort. I followed that with a pretty interesting crash coming down Pilot Rock which led to a very forgetful day.
The 55.5k was a tough day all around, the stomach issues from the day before didn’t do me any favors in recovery and neither did the crash. The conditions were also worse as the trails were beat up from the day before. I did manage to help another racer fix a broken chain, sit down in Laurel Creek for just a minute, and see a bear so that was nice. The weather had been looming all day long and finally just as I started down Pilot Rock the skies opened up Thunder, Lightning, and an amazing amount of water fell turning Pilot into a river and my prescription glasses into a foggy mess. Descending a flooded pilot without being able to see is an interesting task. I made it down ok and after the final aid station I actually had a little life show back up in my legs and was able to really push things up South Mills/Buckhorn and have a ripping good time descending clawhammer. Overall the 111/55 weekend wasn’t as bad as it could have been as I ended up 13th/10th in the two races but I had my sights set higher and really felt like better was well within my reach.
The summer was pretty minimal as far as racing goes, I did most of the summer short track series, which is so not my strength but it was a lot of fun. I’ll definitely try and make it to those again. Then came ORAMM, which was on the heels of some major family health issues and overall really bad timing. However I was registered and we did make it home just in time for me to be able to go. I’m not much of a not show up kind of guy. So I went, the first 2 hours went really well, then quickly, not so well. I came undone, I still don’t think I really overdid it early, I think it was a combination of the weight of the week, some poor nutrition choices, and just not really being mentally there. I finished almost an hour behind where I felt like I wanted to be. With all that said, I was out riding my bike with friends, sometimes you’re just going to have tough ones, and that’s ok.
I put that behind me and started to look ahead to MonsterCross, in the King of Pisgah series this is the one I needed to do well in to try and make a run at 3rd place. I finally felt like I had a good nutrition plan, I was feeling good heading into the race. Race day came, I got a good start, was riding well, then I hit a bump and lost one of the keys to my nutrition plan at about the worst possible time. This messed with me mentally and physically and I slid back in the field. When I started to recover I got a flat and was totally unprepared to deal with it in a true “race” setting. Oh well, another awesome weather day, great course, once again learned some lessons. Mostly out of contention to move up in the standings for KOP.
The last race in the King of Pisgah series, Double Dare, the only one of the series I hadn’t actually done. This race fits into my wheelhouse a little better, its long and counts more on survival rather than speed. It’s two days and I had called on one of my favorite riding partners, Andy from New River Bikes. If it’s a “bad” idea Andy is probably in and will always have a good attitude about it. Andy and I had a pretty good day 1 but made a call late in the day to leave a couple of checkpoints out there that we planned on getting in order to ensure we were back in time, in hindsight we would have had time to get them. Since we bailed on our route day 1 we were pretty much out of contention overall but I figured we had a chance at the SS podium. Interestingly enough I started feeling pretty good Sunday, we made some good route choices and knowing we weren’t in the overall contention tried to keep it on the lighter side. Turns out it worked well for us and we ended up winning the SS division and 4th overall. It was a pretty solid weekend and more fun than I expected, I think I mentally prepared for a total sufferfest.
The last race of the year, which has become one of my favorites right behind PMBAR is Swank 65. I made the decision to ride my new Stumpy ST, gears and squishiness, because hey, why not, I’ve done this one SS a few times and just felt like something different. I got off to a good start and settled into a pretty nice pace riding really close with Art, which was cool. Art’s had a great year and I felt pretty good to be hanging on with him. That was until we started up 229 to Farlow Gap, where I watched Art slowly slip away, when I tried to match his accelerations I just had to sit back down. I had a good bit of fun with the Farlow gnar and the squishiness riding a little more than usual but more than anything just having fun with it. I ended up finishing the day 7 mins faster than last year and 10th overall in a pretty solid field. Most of all I felt pretty good and had a ton of fun which was a great way to cap off the year.
Major thanks to a few folks who really helped me out this year. The most important being Katie for putting up with me and my passion during a tough year for everyone. Balancing family life and a passion for riding/racing bikes along with a more than full time career is pretty tough but Katie helps me through it in a pretty amazing way. A major thanks to Sycamore Cycles with two kids now I’ve had far less time to work on my bikes and Sycamore has been a huge help in keeping them running and it’s been a blast to be part of the race crew this year. Finally thanks to New River Bikes, I don’t live within a few hours of the shop anymore but Andy always helps talk me through things and be ready to ride.
