Tri for your Cause race report

Today i raced in the Tri for your Cause triathlon in Boulder. the race director is a guy named Brent Herron, who is currently applying to med school and will hopefully be a R4WH'er next year. He definitely put on a sweet race, and i'm glad i stuck around town to race. Yesterday i had to pick up my race packet and got a chance to jump in the water. i promply jumped right out, because it was 55 degrees and i had no wetsuit.....this wasn't looking good for the race... while on the ride or camping by bike, i often complain about being cold...this doesn't compare to what i felt in that water. it was like a new years polar bear plunge. i used to think it was BS when people said the water was so cold it took their breath away, but now i've experienced it and it absolutely is for real. yeah i just cited wikipedia.
Anyway i knew i was going to have to get used the water for a good 5 min before even taking a single stroke. So after a good warm up on the bike i literally sat in water for as long as i could stand. i only got about 3 minutes of swimming in before the race, but it was enough to make sure i wasn't going to pass out or hyperventilate....i'm not even overexagerating, it was cold! The swim itself was uneventful luckily, but i was pretty slow without a wetsuit and suffering in the cold.




After the turn i was definitely a little shaky and not holding a straight line, but i think i was delirious so thats OK. The bike route was actually pretty tame considering the terrain boulder has to offer. the first 20 minutes on the bike i was still battling the cold from the swim. I was moving pretty quickly, passing a ton of people. i was riding more aggressively than normal, just to warm up. i actually was seeing double for the first 20 minutes....thats how cold i was. by the end of the bike though i felt pretty good, and in the end i only got passed by one guy, Steve Pyle formerly from connecticut....small world again. i had pretty solid bike time, averaging 23 mph.

The run went just as expected. i knew i wasn't going to be able to run my normal pace at altitude and going off of 3 weeks solely on the bike, sans running. The funny thing about the run was that my feet were still freezing, and the feeling of running was really quite odd. it actually felt like i had super springs in my shoes, and although my feet were numb, it felt quite comfortable and efficient. Overall the run went pretty well and i held 6'30"s the whole way. i think thats a pretty good sign for the summer, considering i did a total of 20 miles for april.

I ended up 13th overall out of probably 250-300 people so i was pretty happy with that. Time to rationalized....being at sea level and with a wetsuit i could have taken about 3 min off my time and been well within the top ten....but whatevs. It was a fun day and afterwards Megan and i checked out Pearl street and got to see a "Boulder Freeze" in action (or inaction.)



Oh yeah, this is for Jen. it happens to all of us.

Denver and Boulder

i've got a couple days before i head back to boston, so i'd figure i'd try and get some skiing and riding in if possible. on friday i headed up to A-basin for some early May powder. it was sunny in denver, but as soon as you passed through the Eisenhower tunnel it looked like this...


The skiing was pretty sweet, with about 6 inches of new stuff. A-basin's got some good terrain, but unfortunately most of the new Montezuma Bowl wasn't open. The winds were pretty high and the snow plentiful, so i couldn't really get the full scope of the mountain, just the 20 ft in front of me. Good stuff, though. especially the tree runs, i love those. i ended up skiing for an hour with a girl from boston who i met on the lift. small world huh?

Here's me skiing with a cycling jacket and other assorted borrowed apparel (thanks katie!)


The ride home was about 4 hrs because of some accident in the tunnel, but i got some Beau Jo's and made it all better....

Today i headed up to Boulder to pick up my packet for the "Tri for your Cause" triathlon (tomorrow) This should be a great race, although the H20 is 55 degrees and i don't have a wetsuit....i'll have to swim pretty fast to stay warm! After testing the water and only lasting 5 minutes, i headed out for a ride on Left Hand Canyon Rd. This place is un-freakin-believable. i probably saw 50+ riders out there at 4pm, and the scenery and terrain is second to none. This place truly is a cyclists mecca. (i'm pretty sure i saw floyd landis too....or a perfect look-a-like) The ride i did was about 2hrs with 3500ft of climbing and headed up to Ward, a small seen-better-days type of town.
Here are a couple of pics from the ride...

Tomorrow's the race (hopefully i don't hit an iceberg) and then a midnight flight home to Beantown.

End of the Road....for now...

The last portion of the ride that i am officially scheduled for took us from Telluride, CO to Pueblo, followed by a quick van ride up to Denver. Leaving Telluride we saw some really cold temps, probably in the upper 20's or lower 30's. Linc left us today, and headed back to Georgia (warm!). Too bad, it was a lot of fun riding with him!


We picked up a couple of new riders too though. Daniel, from T-ride was a buddy of Scott Elkins (our main contact man in telluride, and a pretty strong rider as well). we also we blessed with the presence of all former logistic directors, Chris Connelly and Andrew Suchocki. It was great to see those guys again, and they managed to pack alot of fun into their 2 day stay! So anyway the day out of Tride starts out downhill for 15 miles, and boy they were cold. Afterwards we climbed gradually for 12 miles so that warmed us all up. Daniel gave us a little verbal tour of the MTB'ing in the area, as well as some of the other good road rides.

Daniel and Jen with a sweet background shot.


The downhill was a blast, and Dave, chris, daniel and i flew down all the way to lunch. the remainder of the day was relatively flat ride into Montrose, where we stayed at a methodist church.

Heres Nate and Anuj suggesting a new rest stop sponsor. Suchocki would be so proud.

And Steph and Katie riding a goat.....



The next day's ride took us from Montrose to Gunnison. We had two decent climbs back to back in the beginning, followed by an easy ride past Blue Mesa Lake and into Gunnison. Chris and I had a little race to the top of the first climb, and chris got the better of me by about 10 seconds.... we were both about to pass out at the top, and ashley thought we were totally crazy.
Here's the first group up to the top.

Here's Nate getting an obviously fantastic backrub....these should be standard at all rest stops.


The next day was Continental Divide day, as we rode from Gunnison to Salida. the day starts out easily and relatively flat for about 35 miles. Then we climb for 9 straight, at a consistent grade with no breaks. Then its downhill all the way into Salida.
Heres a google earth view of the Divide


i was hoping to beat Chris and I's time up the hill from last year, which was around 51 minutes from the bottom (avg 10mph). I took the climb pretty hard from the get-go, but it was a little tough without chris there to pace off of and chase after. i was able to keep the pace pretty high for first half, which let me reduce the effort just a tad up by the top (more likely i was just tired!) anyway i made it up to the top in 47:40 or about 10.9 mph. so i was pretty happy with that, chris is going to have to come back next year during his research block and give a shot in 2009. Nate was right behind me in about 50 minutes, followed closely by cory, anuj, jen, joe and kel. Everybody did a great job, and the rest of the hills will be easy now! The way down is super fast, we probably were well over 40mph for 20+minutes. Before we hit Salida HS for the night we stopped at sonic because it was happy hour, and Carissa had never been before. She loved it...Bobby didn't...
Here are the girls at sonic


To cap off a great day a small group of us had some fantastic pizza dinner at Amica's in Salida.

My last day riding with the group was from Salida to Pueblo. This was a ride we didn't get to do in 2007 because of a freak snow storm (actually snow in CO in april/may isn't freak at all, as i learned today) This ride was beautiful! we started out going along the Arkansas river and through a small canyon before our our last bit of climbing in the rockies. it wasn't too difficult, but the scenery was spectacular!
Here's Anuj with the end of the Sangre de Christo mountains as a backdrop.


The day ended for me with a sweet downhill (definitely a little sketchy at times, and Anuj's battle wounds tell the tale here)
After packing everyone into the vans we headed up to Denver for our event at the med school, and maybe i'll write a bit more about that tomorrow....

Utah to Colorado

We're all here in Telluride, CO and finally have another day off from riding. The last few days have been fabulous though, and furthers my belief that Utah is one of the most beautiful states (i still haven't been to wyoming or montana yet though) The last few rides included Hankesville, UT to Natural Bridges State park. this was a killer day!. it started out deceptively easy as we went downhill for nearly 20 miles. the remainder of the 75 miles was slightly uphill and into a hot headwind...definitely a really tough ride. This is one of those rides you always look back on and realize the present ride isn't so bad! Here's a pic from the earlier part of the day, with the Henry mountains in the background.
Thats Jen, Dave, Van, and Joe from L to R.

From natural bridges we headed over to monticello Ut. A good ride, but not as scenic as the last few days. the highlight was karaoke at the MD ranch house that evening.


From monticello we headed over the state line to dolores colorado. It was nice day, but i viewed all the scenery from the car as i took a day to help out dave's support team. Dolores to Telluride was yesterday's ride and it was sweet. we climbed consistently for 50 miles, but it hardly felt like a climb at all with the gentle grade and helpful tailwind. the climb was to the top of lizard's head pass, and the huge amounts of snow at the top made it look like the middle of winter. Here's Nate and I at the top.


Our day off in Telluride has been pretty relaxing so far, most of the team has gotten a good nights sleep and spent the rest of the day checking out the town. We even saw katie holmes in the coffee shop. the best part about it was that there was a poster making fun of Scientology and tom cruise right smack on the coffee shop door....she had to have seen it! Man he is crazy. sorry no pics of katie, but i think cory got a video so i'll see if i can get my hands on it...


anuj dance party....

internet finally!

The last few days have been great. We've traveled from Las Vegas through southern Nevada, and are now half way through Utah. Nevada was so-so scenery wise, nothing really to write home about. we had some great days of riding though, with favorable winds and some challenging climbs. The whole team really enjoyed those days. We didn't hit any bad headwinds until 10 miles outside of Cedar City, Utah. That was a little rough, but we pressed on and earned a rest day in Cedar City. The ride out of the city was one of my favorites last year, and it proved to be a great one again this year. it starts with a 17 mile climb to 10,000 feet, followed by a rolling section through a pine forest with sparse snow cover. The second half of the ride took us through Red Canyon and finally a killer descent next to Bryce Canyon. We even took a 8 mile detour to get a brief tour of fairyland canyon inside of Bryce. It's absolutely gorgeous in there, unlike anything i've ever seen (yeah, even cooler than the grand canyon. ) Today's ride was from Tropic, Ut to Boulder and it might be my new favorite road to ride (ever) stunning scenery, killer climbing, and fast twisty descents. just totally awesome. Tonight Seth and I are staying with Lauren and Tom, two semi-retired physical therapists now living in boulder. The hospitality has been great and the pasta alfredo with shrimp and artichokes was the best meal i've had in a while!

here are ashley, steph, and jen at the hot springs in Alamo, NV

Mike's Tavern Cedar City, home of sweet 3% beers...
Full moon at Bryce Canyon

Tomorrow we head into Hankesville Utah, definitely not much there and we'll be camping for the next two days....and my air mattress just popped....sweet....

First Day

Today was my first official day back with R4WH. i got to meet and chat with the whole team at various points along the way from Tecopa Ca to Vegas. I actually started my day at the Red Rocks canyon and rode out to meet them at the halfway point. This worked out great, as i had a sweet tailwind pushing my up the 10 mile climb to Mountain Springs, and arrived at the halfway point less than 3 minutes before the riders showed up (and got free elk and buffalo jerky from the dude who was there last year, but no gospel band with free coffee though.) The climb back up the mount was rough though, with a nasty cold head wind for 15 miles and totally beat set of legs from the grand canyon the day before.... which is why its great that we have a rest day in vegas today! I've got a shaky internet connection right now, so i'll just throw up one or two pics of out night last in vegas....this is Anuj imitating his twin in the screen behind him. The second is the whole gang after dinner.

Grand Canyon Trail Run

I ended up driving more than twice as long as running today, but it was definitely worth it! The grand canyon is actually really far away from vegas... about 275 miles, but with the 75mph speed limits and straight-as-an-arrow highways its not too bad a drive. i ended up getting to the Canyon at 10am, where the temp was only 42F, but the sun was shining brightly. My plan was to run down the South Kaibab trail to the River trail, and then over to the Bright Angel trail to head back up. The Tonto trail was another option, a little shorter so it would make a nice bail out if needed. the route is reported as 16 miles, so i figured it would be about 4 hours to do. unfortunately i didn't bring out any of my gel flasks, only a waist H20 holder, which only has pockets big enough for a set of keys. I got pretty creative and managed to rig up a batman-esqe utility belt by electrical taping everything i needed to the belt (sunscreen, ipod, keys, 2 gu's, light gloves, vaseline (for blisters...) and my phone(for the camera). worked like a charm, nothing shaking loose or falling off the whole trip.
I started off heading down the S Kaibab trail, which is known to be steeper and has no water available. That alone makes it the best place to start. The way down went well, my knees felt fine, the footing was good, and i was feeling good as well. It only took a little over an hour to get to the bottom, ie junction of River and S Kaibab trail. i didn't even realized i had missed the Tonto trail, but that was ok, i was feeling pretty good. The river trail was really cool, as it shadowed the bank of the Colorado river, from a height of 100ft or so. I took a quick break here, had a gu and emptied out my now pink shoes. The River trail was only about 2-3 miles, but it was the only flat ground i saw all day. A nice relief and chance to get the legs used to running, not just pounding downhill.
The Bright Angel trail is the heavily used touristy trail...and there were alot of folks on it today. it is also less steep (but a little longer) than the Kaibab, so it makes sense to head up this way. Water is also available at the Indian Garden (11mile mark) so definitely best to have this at the end of the day, instead of 4.5 miles in!
Running a canyon is alot different than a mountain run. on a mountain you do the uphill first, so you're fresh. you have to be careful on the downhill, because you're tired and thats when you can get into trouble...but with a canyon its the opposite. the downhill is no problem because you're totally fresh....but then you've got to head back up! Going up the bright angel trail was about 6.5 miles of climbing gaining about 4,500ft. it went by rather quickly (not easily, but it really didn't seem to go on for ever) i was only really hurting for the last mile, or 15minutes so....could have been the altitude, the 3 hours of running, or the fact i was working off of breakfast plus 200 calories....anyway 80% of the uphill was great, just that last bit was tough....


here are a couple pics from today..

and a video while running...a little bumpy...




Tomorrow I wake early and start to ride towards California while R4wh rides towards Nevada....hopefully we'll meet up along the way.....because if we don't i'm gonna be screwed....

Red Rocks Canyon

Well i got into vegas late last night ( around midnight ) grabbed my rental car and headed to my shady hostel a few miles north of the strip. surprisingly enough my rental car costs more than my hostel room, and i think it would probably be safer to sleep in too. so the bike gets to sleep in the car and i'll brave the hostel. anyway the first night was actually fine so i'll probably stay here (instead of switching to a legitimate hotel') til the R4WH crew shows up on saturday. i've got a couple of days here to kill, so today i rode the Red Rocks Canyon loop, a great little climb to the west of the city. Last year everybody had a blast doing this section after we had to cut the middle section short (due to lack-of-bridge,) I was on support that day, so i made up for missing it by riding it three times today!

Here's a google earth view



And here are a couple of pics from the today's ride






and heres a quick panoramic video while riding....


Tomorrow i'll probably meet up with the guys from the Southern Nevada Tri club and do their thursday morning ride. Friday I think i'll hit up the Grand Canyon and check out the Kaibab and Bright Angel trail.

12 days left til vegas

i head out west on april 9th, and i'll get a few days to hang in las vegas before the crew arrives on the 12th. i figure i'll probably rent a car and check out the grand canyon for a day, and also head up to red rock canyon and do a ride up there. everybody raved about that loop last year, i distinctly remember stories of mark bombing the downhills at 50mph racing trucks or something....probably with no shirt on...

training wise, i actually haven't got a lot of riding in at all. looking back at last year i really didn't ride much before i hit san diego either.....last year at this point i had only gotten 15 rides in since jan 1, and as it turns out i've done the same amount this year. i have got 33 runs in and 19 days of XC skiing, so hopefully that fitness will carry over.

i just finished up my radiology block so i'll have the next week off and will get some definite saddle time in (if this rain lets up!)
heres a screenshot of my garmin/sporttracks file the ride i did up wachusett mtn this week (more of just a test to see how the these pics post)

More Pics

Since i have about 10gb's of pics from the ride (everbody's combined) i'll just throw up a couple more.




well, i can't seem to upload any more pics at this time so i'll call it a night. i hope all the former R4WH peeps from last year are doing great!

back in the saddle again

As i get ready for the third incarnation of the Ride for World Health (my second time around, albeit a shorter version this time) i've decided to start up a blog. Mainly so all my former R4WH's can live vicariously through me, but also to keep Chrissy-Poo writhing in jealousy. So i guess i'll start it off with a couple of my favorite pics from last year!

Ummm......Powerbars.......




Mark as usual....



100 degrees and Hari's in tights


sash, hari and i getting some del taco lovin'


Vegas montage....

Vegas is where i'm meeting up with this year's crew, on April 12th. Blogging is harder work than it looks....i'm going to bed, more pics tomorrow.