Met up with Marty @ Geekhouse today so he could do some measurements for my 2012/2013 team frame. Much excite.
You gona finish the 2012/13 season in the PNW?
very nice. what of this moving to pdx? planning to do a few races there this season. at least one cross crusade just for fun so i can get demolished
I am so out of the loop. I just start looking at houses in Seattle to keep up with da bears and they are already moving onto PDX.
my first year
gonna do the crusades since they’re what all my bros wanna do
but i’d love to do some of the gpmc races too, the courses are rad and waaaaay less crowded
No surprise, but I’m pretty unprepared. At least I’ve been able to to get some longer rides in this summer.
The clinic I went to a few weeks ago was pretty helpful. I feel like my barriers and runups will at least be better this year.
Still undecided on what categories I want to race this year, but I think I want to do more Masters races so I can race with my long balled brethren.
Also need to buy some tires and build some wheels.
Also, what Crusade races do you Portlandbros recommend? Maybe we can plan a family visit around one.
Castelli skinsuits marked way down for non-team bros.
http://www.departmentofgoods.com/sales/search.html?mv_session_id=SmXLeJCK&q=castelli+skinsuit
broken collarbone has really fucked with my riding. Still see if i can put together a wheelset and do a race or two, but 5ish weeks off the bike will really fuck you in july/august
plan on doing some races this year. SS most likely. i have no idea what to expect accept some pain. Assembling bike now.
Let my license expire with a cat 3. I think i should be able to re up it and get cat 3 back. Hopefully I will, I don’t want to race in the 4’s again.
Starting to do 2 hour rides 3-4 days a week. a friend’s doing a training plan so It’ll be focused this year. In the past years, I didn’t train until the cross practices start, so this year should be fun!
Also, any input on these? I’ve got one mud2 for the front so I need a rear tire.
ive used em, super fast rolling fwiw
That’s what a review said. It also said he started riding them at 50, then only dropped it to 40 and he said cornering wasn’t best. Doesn’t really apply to me cos I usually run tires at ~30. Getting them at cost so I may just get them and stop over thinking things.
yeh i rode em in the upper 30s but im like 195 pounds…
i’ve ridden most of them.
alpenrose is the traditional opener and usually sets the world record for race attendance. if it’s dry, the ruts break your back. if it’s wet, the slippery off-cambers break your will to live. a very twisty, turny course with lots of re-accelerating out of hairpins, and a few short/steep up/downs.
rainier is a rad course and known for benefiting the climbers of the pack, although the ‘climb’ is paltry by road standards (about 3 minutes of hard suffering). it’s a lot more wide-open than alpenrose with more steady gains and losses in elevation, and the back section is really fun in the mud. there’s some cool tabletops to air off as well.
bend is a fucking dust bowl in the dry. fun course, lots of volcanic ash/sand buried in the soil, so it kicks up and kills visibility on the first lap when the pack’s a mass. course is split between said dusty section and the grass area (check behindthebarriers’ usgp vid from last year for a good review of the course). would probably be really fun in the mud, haven’t been there when it’s wet.
pir @ the track is very fast, flat and all-out in the dry. it’s a dream come true if you’re good at flat TT’s. in the wet, it gets very slow and sloggy, but nonetheless a total powerfest that favors roadies (specifically those who know how to breakaway on crits, or power through a TT well).
pir @ pro paddock is a bit more technical, with the motocross course being one prominent feature and the organizers usually adding in a lot of twists/turns through rooted tree-lined sections of varying bumps/molehills. fun.
hillsboro is pancake flat and about 1/2 of it is speed based, 1/2 technical/hairpin based. another back-breaker in the dry.
barton is my favorite ever. it’s at a gravel quarry, and as such vitamin G is the main terrain feature. some very painful runups (in the good way), turns are wide-open and taken at speed, race is a total blast in the wet or dry. a few tech-ish sections, nothing crazy, except the off-camber descent that somehow a cat C breaks their collarbone on, without fail, annually. (if you’ve ever ridden a decent MTB trail, it’s nothing. if your only exposure to bikes is riding to work via bike path, it may be considered “technical”).
all in all, i’d recommend barton for the course and alpenrose for the experience. halloween @ bend also applies for the best of both. and if you plan on coming here, race a GPMC on saturday and a crusade on sunday so you get to experience small field oregon racing vs. massive fields and crowds. GPMC is more laid back but has some good courses (and a couple duds). crusade has a pretty good near-monopoly on great courses, spectatorship and organization, but it def gets old racing against 150 other people by mid-season.
btw: if my descriptions of “this one feels good in the mud, that one hurts your back in the dry” didn’t do much justice, there’s pretty decent footage both from a helmet’s and spectator’s perspective re: all the crusade courses on youtube. watching said videos on the trainer was actually one way i’d prep for courses i hadn’t raced before.
We’ve been doing Thursday night cross practice the past few weeks. One of my teammates has been leading cross-fit style drills for core-strength building, then there are bike handling drills like cornering and barriers, then a several lap mock race on a tough 2.5 mile course we’ve got mapped out. Tonight was the first time I made it to the park in time for the core builder drills. Holy shit am I sore. I’m going to be gimping around the office tomorrow.
Hopefully it’ll pay off if I keep it up each week. I’m assuming with a stronger core I’ll be less prone to getting “cross back” every bumpy race.
Hey Josh, any word on Kitten kit arrival date?
Hotlap from the Baller’s Ride day 2 (cross practice). From Memorial Day. Spooky Mickey on the right after I remount. Jeff Buchanan of Buchanan Bicycles on the right at the start. Great guy starting up in the FB biz.
http://ergottwheels.smugmug.com/Other/Ballers-2012/23212518_b5fRsg#!i=1871252251&k=kTpn5NP&lb=1&s=L
Last I heard they were shipping around the 14th. So excite.