From Freezer to Frying Pan: AZT 50 Miler

Hit one of my favorite sections of the Arizona Trail (AZT) today, roughly from Mt Wrightson to where it crosses Rt 183. Isaac and I started out on pavement, heading south on Rt 183. Pavement gave way to dirt, jeep road initially, at the 17 mile mark. There was a fair amount of climbing to get over the pass at around 5200ft elevation. Isaac pulled my sorry butt all the way up there.

Not even a mile from the car, I was futzing with my GPS. It was not working. I was on the negligible shoulder of the road not looking forward. Without warning I crashed through a thorny bush (there are no other kinds in the desert) that was overhanging the shoulder. Just like that, I had bloody streamers running down my right leg. Glad I could provide entertainment for Isaac.

Garmin's are notoriously temperamental. I've had good luck with my 510 until now. Worked perfectly Sunday. Monday morning, FUBAR. The GPS function itself would work, meaning it could show me where on Earth I was, but none of the cycling/computer/data recording functions worked. First full day of a trip where GPS navigation is crucial. SOB! It's bad enough when you lose data for an epic ride, but it looked like I was screwed for the whole trip.

But that was only the beginning of the climbing. Once on the AZT, there are innumerable drops into washes with steep climbs back out. This took a huge toll on me, with so few cycling hours in my legs. I'm sure Isaac was loving it. There are a lot of sketchy switchbacks too, several of which I dared not attempt. Why are right-hand switchbacks so much more challenging to me than left-hand?

I extended the loop this year from all my previous rides on this section of the AZT by picking it up much further south. The added content is a keeper. Climb to a higher elevation, about 5800ft closer to the Mt Wrightson Wilderness, before a ruckus singletrack descent we both liked. (Strava track)

The prized part of this ride is the last 10 miles which steadily lose elevation on buff, rollercoaster singletrack.  Isaac said his cheeks were hurting from smiling so much. Yeah, it's that good.

After a couple hours surfing forums, I regained some functionality of my Garmin 510. Had to reformat, as in storage device FAT formatting. It still behaves bizarrely when Windows attempts to mount it, but I was able to capture a track and upload it to Strava. We shall see if it works for a 6-7hr ride planned for Tuesday.  Anyway, it is late, so I'll leave you with a few photos.

High point of the ride, looking towards, maybe into Mexico.

Isaac at high point with Mt Wrightson Wilderness in background.

Nothing but cooler temps and grasslands up here above 5200ft.

Many miles of steep, gnarly terrain.

Approaching switchback none of us can clean.

The ripping smooth last 10 miles.

Abrupt Transistion

What a ski season it has been, and it is far from over. This past Tuesday was the last points race at Weston. I skied six of the seven points races. An eighth race was cancelled due to a blizzard. The Tuesday Night Worlds, as some call it, were a staple of my fitness routine for most of the last two months. With ample snow and a long course set up, I could expect to suffer mightily for 25 minutes.

There is mounting evidence that intensity, not volume, helps older athletes slow the inevitable decline in fitness metrics. After reading excerpts from Friel's new book, I'll have to pick up a copy. Weston, and Nordic skiing in general, places very high demands on the cardiovascular systems, certainly way more than I could ever experience on an indoor trainer. And ski racing with another 80-90 like minded crazies is a heck of a lot more fun than stuffy go no where indoor routines.

My performance is becoming more consistent across a variety of conditions. I wouldn't say this was a break-out year for me, but I have been finishing closer to the front of Weston races and just posted my fastest time at Rangeley. I guess when cycling is almost impossible outside with the weekly blizzard series we had this year, there is nothing to do but ski. It should be no surprise this brings about more consistent results.

On Saturday, I hooked up with long time no see Dave Penney for a skate at Waterville Valley. You'd never know the last time Dave skate-skied was almost two years ago. Conditions were almost as good as they get. Firm, maybe a tad squeaky due to low overnight temp, and mint weather.

Yes, Dave is still alive. Top of Upper Snows looking at Thornton Gap.

Myself coming around Bob's Lookout. Snow still almost up to top of picnic tables.

It's time to start thinking about cycling again, transitioning ski hours to ride hours. But how do you do that when there is still 30" of snow on the ground and roads are too dangerous to ride? Head to Tucson, Arizona for a week.

With any luck, on Sunday Isaac and I will get in a short ride in Saguaro cactus forest before the sun sets. Then it is a full week of desert trail riding with temps soaring into the 80's, some 80 degrees warmer than my last MTB ride. I've never gone into a week of huge volume with so little hours in the legs. I've barely average 2hrs per week for a couple months. This will be the most abrupt transition to riding I've experienced, both in temperature and in volume. We have some 100km+ rides mapped out. Going to be tough staying hydrated. We'll go from a cold dryness to a dry heat. Some will argue you dehydrate just as quickly in the cold as you do in the heat. I don't know. I've never chugged a 32oz bottle of Gatorade without coming up for air in the cold like I did after a ride in the desert one time. Really looking forward to it. The skiing has been great, but I miss the bike.

0% precip for the week and almost too hot. I'll take it.

Rangeley Loppet 2015

My how time flies. I first did the Rangeley Loppet in 2005 when it was held on the old course. Can barely remember what that course was like. That was back when I still struggled with asthma, and that particularly year, it was brutally cold and I struggled mightily with asthma.

The race was moved to the new trail system near Saddleback Mountain shortly after that. The new venue is much more fun to race. I raced the Rangeley Loppet most years since 2005. It's been a good test of progress in the skate technique.

24 hours before the race, the director pushed start times back one hour to give the temperature more time to rise. Forecasts varied, but overnight lows were expected to dip well below zero Fahrenheit. I had mixed feelings on that. Starting at 11am meant I would get back home late and make for a long day. Plus I could have driven over the morning of and not needed an expensive room. On the plus side, maybe I wouldn't freeze my ass off and skis would be a little faster. I did wax for very cold conditions though, so if it warmed too much, my skis could actually get slower.

I don't really warm up much for endurance events. As a fast twitcher, it doesn't seem to do me much good. Sure, the start can be a mad sprint to the narrow trail, but the race isn't decided there. There's another 2.5-3hrs to go after that. The course was packed rock-hard powder. How can powder be rock-hard? Simple. It is snow that has not been transformed by a thaw cycle, repeatedly groomed, with recurring sub-zero nights to set it up. It was cold and squeaky, but you could almost call it fast.

How I waxed:
 - Toko Moly/Toko HF Blue mix, scrape and brush.
 - Toko HF Blue, scrape and brush.
 - Star FC, brush (a cold temp pure fluoro, applied with high heat wearing respirator).

All 25k and 50k skaters go off in one big wave. There must have been at least 10 starting lanes. I lined up third row from the front behind Brett Rutledge, my training partner and nemesis in ski racing. There were no crashes in front of me as we blasted down the narrow first kilometer. The first little rise always drives things to a screeching halt. Poles and skis invariably get stepped on. Have to be so protective of your gear.

After we pop out on what Google shows as a road, things sort out and string out. This is where drafting becomes a big deal. Speeds are around 20kph and there can be headwind there. Brett is about 5 skiers up in the same gruppetto.

Then the first non-trivial climb hits us, a wee bump really, a 100ft rise under the powerlines. Some drift back, others advance. The trail is pretty narrow there, so it is very difficult to advance. You have to skate over the classic tracks and hope you don't catch a tip in the deep bank at the edge of the trail.  I managed to bridge up to Brett.  It is not uncommon for me to be with Brett or even pass him early in a marathon, but his slow twitch efficiency always gets the best of me before the end.

We drop back down at high speed with an abrupt 90deg turn at the bottom. Brett and I both need to improve in this particular scenario. Wouldn't you know it, Brett loses it and I couldn't avoid him. I stacked pretty hard and drove my knee into the trail. Don't even think it left a mark in the trail, but it sure registered in my brain. Ouch! Just like driving knee into ice. The whole gruppetto we were with passed and dropped us. We were gaining nicely on two other rivals Kurt and Robert, but now they were gone.

The course gets progressively hillier after that. The next two climbs are over 300ft each. Never terribly steep, but lots of little dips and tight turns meant constant changes in tempo and intensity. Fun, but it beats you down after a while.

Finally, about half way around the 25k circuit, a 300ft plummet is reached. Most years I easily exceed 50kph bombing down it. It is long and mostly straight. This year, I barely broke 40kph in a full tuck. Guess the snow wasn't very fast after all.

Crossing the start-finish line, two guys peeled off to finish their 25k race. That left us with five guys I think, me, Brett, Kurt and two others. I was getting tired. Any time Brett led up a climb, I'd get gapped. I was being very careful to not go full throttle in these bursts, as that leads to cramping.  I'm getting a little better cornering at speed, but I still scrub speed into the steepest, fastest turns instead of stepping through them. I was counting on closing small gaps in the technical descents.

Every endurance race I've done I find myself in a deep, dark place at some point in the race. This was particularly true in this race.  I was struggling mightily to stay with Brett and Kurt, getting gapped on every rise, taking risks on the descent to bridge back up to them. My glutes were turning into jelly and I was sure my hip flexors were about to cramp. Why do I do this again? Am I having fun yet? I should have just gone to Waterville Valley and skied a recreational 50k. Yeah, that would have been more fun. And a lot less money. And less time in the car. I'm killing myself for what, 5th or 6th place out of 10? This is stupid. This was going through my head for the longest time.

Then on one of the descents, I'm trying in vain to bridge back up to Brett. I come into a high speed sweeping turn where I knew Brett would scrub speed. Yeah, I'll totally get back a few seconds there. Nope. Epic fail. Must have let my weight get too far back on my skies and totally lost it. Already in a dark place, now I was ready to just abandon this stupid race. I hadn't crashed at Rangeley in years, and now twice in one race. It wasn't even icy!

Now Brett and Kurt were pretty much out of site. I bet I lost 30 seconds getting going again and I was skiing in no man's land. Brett had somebody to work with and I had little hope to catch them with only 10km to go in the race.

But pick away at that gap I did. Don't know where the resolve was coming from. Maybe I just wanted the pain to be over. Somewhere around the start-finish (which we pass twice per lap), a made contact with 4km to go. I've never beaten Brett in a Marathon, and Kurt beat both of us here last year. How was this going to play out?  My mind was getting back into the race.

I came up with a plan. I sensed Kurt was starting to fade on the climbs. There was only one minor climb left in those last 4k, about 2k from the finish. I needed to punch that and hopefully drop Kurt. Brett was still skiing strong, so I knew he was going to hang on.

At first, Brett asked to come around on the climb. Crap. How is my plan going to work if I'm going so slow that I'm being passed?  With a steep punch toward the top, I felt if I dug really deep, I could pick it up a notch. Brett obliged. It worked. We gapped Kurt.

Now we come into a mostly downhill sequence of chicanes. I can barely step these at speed and was hoping to go fast enough that Brett would have no chance of coming around me. It worked. With less than 1km to go, Brett is still right on me.  There is a steep wall, maybe only 30ft rise, 200m from the finishing stadium. Now my adrenaline was going. If I just don't screw this up, trust my fast twitch, I might be able to hold Brett off. It worked, again.

We both hung on our poles gasping loudly for a good while after crossing the finish. Don't think I've ever sprinted so hard. Usually I finish Rangeley without another skier in sight and just stroll in.  I would never have been able to push that hard if Brett wasn't right there.  We crossed the line in 2:42, a best for both of us on that course, and it certainly was not the fastest conditions we've been on.

I was surprised to see Brett and I took 3rd and 2nd place respectively. I've never podiumed a marathon before, so that felt pretty good. And to think 30 minutes from the finish I wanted to abandon the race.


There's many good days left to this ski season, but my thoughts now shift toward Arizona. I'm heading there with Isaac next week to ride the awesome desert trails around Tucson. The skiing has been fabulous, but I miss tires on dirt. The snow will still be here when we come back.

TNW

With record snow tallies, the "Tuesday Night World's" at Weston is thriving. I missed a week when I suspected dubious conditions. But the last couple weeks were fabulous. A challenging, nearly 3km course is now laid out over the original snow-making area and a long finger out into the "flats."

I came to this week's race slightly less tired than last week's. I lined up in the A-wave one row further up, row 8. Based on my finishing place, I could line up one or two more rows up. There are about 15 rows in each wave. But I'm not a strong starter and tend to get gapped in the first 500 meters. It is better that I not create a bottleneck. But it also means I have to fight like hell to gain those dropped positions back.

We do a rolling NASCAR start. After about 200m or so, the race goes live. Actually, it felt pretty live as soon as we started rolling. Robert Faltus started just behind me but promptly passed me and latched on to the lead pack of 20 or so skiers. That pack proceeded to go bye-bye as a gap opened and there was nothing I could do about it. Dang! It was perfect powder conditions, zero wind, upper 20's for temp. In other words, it doesn't get better than that. Didn't I warm up thoroughly enough?

Nobody was coming around me either, and the other half of the A-wave was either content with me up front or became as instantly gassed as I did.  I didn't single-handedly drag us up. Skiers started to get spit out of that lead group and I think Mark Doughty and one or two others might have come up for stints. We scooped up Robert.

By end of lap two, I think we were down a 5-some, me, Robert, Mark, Bob Burnham and Jessica Snyder. After a big pull, I got tired on the flats on the third and final lap. Jessica and Bob came around. Jessica took a massive pull, being small and not leaving much of a draft in her wake. I was gasping.  That was enough to pop Robert and Mark off I think, but they were dangling oh so close behind. I know from experience if I come into the finish with Robert, he'll decisively trounce me.

With less than two minutes to go, it was Jessica, Bob and me on the lower part of the course below the club house. Bob caught a rut and very nearly went down. I nearly went into him and he didn't even crash! That is how close together we were skiing and at a pretty good clip there too, having just dropped down. Then not 5 seconds later, Jessica apparently did the same thing and hit the deck hard. How Bob and I both avoided stacking on top of her is beyond me. There are many turns and hills in those last two minutes. I could not hold Bob's draft the rest of the way in. I crossed the line about 3 seconds behind him for 14th overall and 12.7% back from winner.

Was not a fast conditions night, but it was probably my best TNW race so far. Form felt decent, which it should in perfect conditions. Didn't make any tactical errors either. I've learned you have to be super aggressive in the first couple kilometers. Gaps will open, and it is too easy to be complacent and hope "somebody" is going to come around to pull you back up there. Just like in a bike race, if it matters to you, that somebody is has to be you. The last couple races I spent a lot of time out front with others in tow. Fun stuff, my primary mid-week workout, and it looks like I can count on it for many weeks to come.

I'll leave you with a photo from Friday's ski at Windblown. Mt Monadnock may look pretty, but it was a frightfully cold, windy day.

What's in your pie chart?

I've been keeping a training log for going on 15 years now. Only aerobic activities are quantitatively tracked. It would be cool to animate the distribution of my activities over the course of a year. In a good winter, Nordic skiing would quickly dominate my pie chart, only to be squashed back down as summer moves in and cycling hours grow. Then as the end of the year approaches, skiing would start to push back on cycling hours again.

This winter is proving to be the particularly challenging to get quality riding in outdoors. By quality, I mean riding without constant fear of vehicles taking you out on roads barely wide enough for two cars to pass. Or riding off-road without constantly battling for control in powder. Or fighting weekly snowstorms.

I've learned several years ago to not fight ma nature when she thwarts your attempts to ride. Let ma nature be your ally.  There are many snow sports that can be enjoyed for similar durations and intensity levels as riding bikes. One I've become particularly fond of is skate skiing. The cool thing about skate skiing is how similar it is to mountain biking. The aerobic intensities, the average and max speeds, the adrenaline rushes going downhill, lung searing climbs, in the woods away from cars - all very similar between the two activities.

Even though I have a mountain biking trip to Arizona coming up in less than four weeks, I've pretty much given in to the fact that skiing is going to carry my fitness over until then. Just as well. I have a 50k ski race the week before my trip.

I ordered some snowshoes, so before this winter closes out, there will be an additional colored slice to my pie chart. Maybe next winter will be a dud and mostly riding will be had. Either way, I'm covered.

Isn't it ironic...

don't you think? A little too ironic... and yeah, I really do think. The words of Alanis Morissette come to mind when looking out the window.  Nordic skiers and fat bikers alike were doing the snow dance while a snow drought persisted, and now we have snow by the foot.

I've never been one to "ride" indoors. I find it mentally abrasive, no different than say being blasted by music you hate or overwhelmed by the stench from a landfill. I've dabbled with indoor trainers a few times but just couldn't reach that flow state of mind that is achieved by moving yourself through the outdoor environment.

There was one year I missed only three days riding outside. I had no goal of riding everyday outside. Things just happened that way. I think the days I missed were due to business travel. I rode trails in the winter when I could. A 26" wheeled mountain bike with 2" wide tires didn't offer much float. The snow either needed to be super powdery or frozen granular. Winters were hit or miss. Some winters I was banished mostly to the road, until I discovered that Cape Cod often stays free of snow when the rest of New England is socked in white.

Was there a way to embrace the snow without involving two wheels? Yes there was. That is when cross country skate skiing entered the picture. This was something more aerobically demanding than riding and used many of the same muscles. How awesome was that?! If conditions got too crappy for riding, there was a high probability conditions would be superb for skiing. There was no way to lose!

This has been my modus operandi for a better part of a decade now.  When roads become dangerous and trails too deep to ride, skis perfectly provided the means to achieve an endorphin enhanced state of mind-flow.

Earlier this season, trails were staying bare, maybe a little snow cover, and sometimes a lot of ice. Had to drive to find marginal snow to ski, but the local riding was pretty good, especially just a bit south. Fat bikers were actually driving north to find snow to ride their bikes on! It had never occurred to me to drive somewhere just to ride a bike on snow when you could ride right here on dirt. My how things turned around. The fat bike phenomenon caught on way faster than mountain biking itself did or the singlespeed movement did. Wonder what that Kool Aid was spiked with?  The bikes evolved at a dramatic pace too.

The lack of snow earlier this winter was quickly made up. The last two storm accumulations were measured in feet. Everybody should be rejoicing, right? This is where paths diverge between the fat biker and Nordic skier camps.

You see, there never is such a thing as too much snow for a skier. More is always better, ensures a long and prosperous ski season. Riding off-road is a different story. When a large snow dump occurs, at first the trails are unrideable, even by fat bikes. There is too much resistance and even 5" wide tires won't float on two feet of powder. The trails need to be packed first, no different really than Nordic trails being groomed for skate skiing. Local snowmobile clubs will pack their trails. However, sled traffic often keeps the surface pretty loose and soft. Rideable, sure, but fun, maybe not so much.

The utopia fat bikers seek is packed singletrack trails. How does that come about? You enlist teams of your fat bike friends to go snowshoe stomping the trails. Great exercise in the great outdoors, a worthy activity all by itself. But say the trails are just starting to pack enough to ride and another big snow dump moves in. Son of a bitch! Start all over again. Buy a fat bike to ride in the snow, then when it snows you can't ride your bike in it. Oh the irony!

To be honest, I wouldn't mind more off-road riding opportunities during the winter. I tried a fat bike for a season and a half but had to part with it after it repeatedly crippled my knees. I can only assume the really wide Q-factor was behind this. So I've been pricing out 29er+ bikes. These basically are a regular 29er mountain bike designed to accommodate 3" wide tires yet still have a standard width bottom bracket. A 29er+ is far from a fat bike, but it at least splits some of the difference.  The only reason I haven't moved on this yet is I would really like to put 3" studded tires on it, and right now nobody makes one. There is probably not enough demand for somebody to ever produce one. So what to do?

In the mean time, I'll continue to log ski miles and see how many 40 and 50km days I can do this season. Everybody should embrace the snow. Shoeing your favorite trails shouldn't just be a means to an end. The process of staying fit outdoors should be reward in of itself.

Weston Worlds, 2015 Opener

The Tuesday night crit-on-snow race series has begun at Weston on the Leo J. Martin golf course. A large group showed up Tuesday, despite frigid temp, with over 80 racers between the A and B fields. With conditions marginally sketchy after a full day of activities on the course, I pondered for a moment if I shouldn't race in the slower B group. Hard packed conditions brings out the worst in my weak technique.

I queued up a little further back than I was at the end of last season. Looking around, I realized I was still too far up with faster skiers behind me. Before I could even give this a second thought, we were off.

I made it through the freshly made mashed potatoes snow ok, but then the speed picks way up on the hard pack. Should be easy drafting, right? At least conditions were fast even though it was cold. I hemorrhaged several places. Coach Maddy came around and I thought I at least need to stay in her draft. My useless flailing just wasn't delivering enough kilojoules to the snow. Maddy slowly faded away into a tiny silouette down the fairway. Bye-bye.

After a large gap opened, a few more skiers came around. Marv, Robert, Tom and Viktoria. Ok, I can usually hang with these folks. I was still going backwards though, and I was afraid to look back and see there was nobody left behind me!  But hang I did. Marv was drilling it with many in tow for all of lap two. Laps were running about 1.8km.

Some fractures were opening in our group on the climbs in the third and final lap. I took advantage of this weakness and moved up a few spots to behind Marv. That move burned matches. Moments later on the long gradual climb by "Mt Weston," I came to the front. Stupid I thought, as there is much flat terrain and a downhill before the finish. Everybody was still there, and surely they would all pass me just before the finish. One did, Robert. Robert does much better than me on fast, hard packed terrain.

You know how in the Olympic races they all fall over after crossing the line? Well, that was almost me. That was the hardest I breathed since doing this last year at Weston. I did reasonably well, finishing 14-15% back from the winner, right where I was last season. Great workout and good mid-week adrenaline rush. Can't wait to do it again!