Night Riding

Summer is now wrapping up and the light is fading faster each day. For me to get any kind of ride in after work now requires some "artificial" light. Last night was my first night ride of the season. For anyone who doesn't own a light as Ferris once said, "It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up." I have a Niterider, it's an HID light so it casts an insanely bright bluish-white light that lights up the trail like your own little piece of the sun. If you’re looking into buying one, they can be pretty pricey, but I would say to extend your riding season it is well worth it.

Night riding is a totally different experience, the trail you ride everyday seems foreign. You see things that you never noticed before. Your sight is completely limited to the small area of light cast in front of you; this forces you to be incredibly focused. There are no other visual distractions since the rest of your world is black. It’s amazing what this focus can do for your riding, I will clean lines at night that I have a hard time with in daylight. This limited sight also heightens your other senses, I never hear the wind when I ride, but during night rides the sound can seem defining at times.

Night riding by yourself is a whole different experience, it's creepy, and I always freak myself out. Nails left in the trees from trail markings reflect back at you like a pair of eyes. The night creatures scurry around you and always sound as if they are chasing you. It's usually when I am riding solo at night that I see more animals then ever, mostly deer, funny thing is they often freeze (like a deer in headlights, duh). I have even come close to hitting one or two.

So that's it, night riding is fun. If you don't own a light, buy one.

Wrap it up

So the EFTA series is now wrapped up. Unfortunately the mechanical issues that forced me to DNF in the last race also cost me the podium in the Expert Men’s Overall title. Bummer.

Expert Men’s Overall Standings
1. MILLETT, AARON 1,164
2. CURRIER, BRIAN 748
3. WHEELDEN, TODD 588
4. BRADLEY, ADAM 550
5. LITTLEFIELD, RYAN 528

Expert Senior I Men
1. BRADLEY, ADAM 958
2. SAMPSON, TOM 726
3. TAUTFEST, NOAH 368

So that's how it wrapped up, 4th place in the overall men’s standings and 1st in the Senior I category. Not too bad, although I really would have liked to podium in the overall standings. I guess that gives me a goal for next year.

Looking back at the season I did miss 4 of the 9 races; one for vacation, one for a funeral, and two DNF's. I guess to finish in the top five overall with only 5 finishes in a 9 race series is pretty good. Next year I hope to limit the DNF's with some better race preparation.

We have some pretty fast guys in the men's overall standings with myself being the youngest. My age is a good thing as most cyclists peak in their 30's, so the podium is still within reach for a few years. Things to watch out for next year, the top three obviously; but Ryan Littlefield has a way of really stepping it up in the back half of the season and in the Senior I category Tom Sampson at just 18 years old has been killing it lately, he will definitely be a threat for next year.

With the season now over I feel like I have some time to enjoy myself on the bike and not be worried about accomplishing my training goals. I already have a very busy "fun" ride schedule that I am looking forward to.

Last year in the "off season" I spent a lot of time in the gym trying to follow "The Cyclist's Training Bible" and I feel that really made a difference. This year I want to start the program a little earlier so I can be through the muscle building stage and begin building my endurance well before the season starts. Last year I started late so I had very little time on the bike when the first race kicked off, and it showed.

Overall I am happy with my results from this season and I am looking forward to some downtime and more fun rides before I start my winter training program.

My goals for next season:
1st place Senior I category in the EFTA series
Top 3 in the Men’s Overall in the EFTA series
Top 5 finish in the Expert Men’s 25-29 age group at the Mt. Snow NORBA Nationals
Top 5 finish in the NH 100
Top 10 finish in the VT50*

*The VT 50 sells out very quickly each year, just to get an entry spot for next year is a challenge.

Wicked Season Ender

So Sunday was the Season Finale, the Grillz Memorial race in Georgetown Maine. I was looking forward to this race all week, and feeling strong on the few rides I did during the week. I did well here last year; in fact it was in here, the last race of last season that I secured the Senior I title. This year I already have the Senior I title locked up, but I went to race to try Secure my position as 3rd in the overall points series. I was hopping for a top 5 finish...

On my Thursday night ride I noticed some drivetrain issues, I though I had isolated it to the cassette so Saturday I replaced it and had everything working fine in the repair stand. So Sunday morning I wake up at 5am, drive 180 miles to Reid State Park in Georgetown Maine and feel ready to race. However as I head out to warm up quickly noticed that as soon as I put some power to the pedals in any kind of rough section the chain drops from the chain ring. Everything else is working fine in the drivetrain, clean, quick shifts but when the suspension is active and I am hammering it drops the chain. I am not expert mechanic and everything that I can fix with confidence seems to be working fine, so I choose to try and ride this one out.

This is a mass start, so the Elites went out and the whole expert class went out 1 minute back of them. The starting line goes straight down a double track into the parking lot then pulls a u-turn and heads right into the singletrack where it inevitably bottlenecks. Knowing this, I lined up early to get a good starting position and put it up in the big ring ready to hammer. As we headed into the singletrack I had a pretty good position about 10 back in a field of 40 or so. The first 100 yards of singletrack is pretty gnarly singletrack with a short steep climb that ends up being a hike a bike in race conditions. This worked out better for me anyway as my drivetrain would not have held the chain if I tried to power up this. As I got back on the bike I held my position but I had to "baby" my bike along the choppy, rooty, rocky typical Maine course for fear of dropping the chain. Sure enough about a 1/2 mile in, it happened. Being so close to the start the expert class was still bunched together so as I pulled over to put the chain back on over half the field passed me. Then about another quarter mile up, again the chain drops. Now at this point the whole expert field is gone.

The only reason I was at this race was to try and get some overall expert points, but with the entire field well ahead of me, I could forget about that. However I figured that if I woke up this early and drove this far, I was gonna ride my bike. I finished the lap and headed out for another. As I made my way around the second lap I dropped the chain again a few more times. Each time the chain dropped it would make this horrific metal snapping sound. I soon realized that I should wrap it up rather than do more damage to my bike. So at the end of the second lap I pulled myself out of the race.

DNF the last race of the season, what a bummer. I was really looking forward to this race and with a week of preparing to have to end it so early kind of felt like getting blue balled. At least I got to see some hot bike on bike action...

The Flatest Century in the East

This past weekend was The Flattest Century in the East (TFCE). This wasn't a ride I was really looking forward to, as I like to climb, but I had a few family members doing the race so I joined them.

Before we started the ride I set the goal of breaking the 5 hour mark, but I wasn't too committed to it because I figured I would be doing a lot of the pulling and with last mountain bike race of the season next weekend I didn't want to burn myself out. So I started out with my Dad and we keep the pace comfortable at just above 20 miles and hour. About 15 miles in we got picked up by some local shop guys from Village Bicycle. When I looked back the group was about 14 deep, it wasn't too long before the pace was kicked up considerably. Over the next few miles guys started pealing off the back as we held a steady mid-20's pace reaching close to 30 at times. I jumped into the group a few guys back so I got a chance to watch they dynamic of the group before it was my turn to pull. When I stepped up I keep the pace around 23 miles an hour and did my pull for a solid mile or two. As I came off the front I got a lot "nice pull" from a few out of breath guys in the back. This was my first ride with an aggressive pace line, it was really fun.

As we approached the 30 mile check in the group faded to just 6 or so riders and I was surprised to see my dad still hanging in there. After a quick top off of the Water bottles we headed out again but with a few extra riders. There was only 17 miles to the next checkpoint so the pace was pretty fast; I put in some solid pulls and again got a few complements from it. By time we reached the 47-mile check in the group was down to just 3 shop riders, my dad and I. It was here Dave commented that the pace was "comfortable" at that point I realized comfortable is a relative term.

As we left the mid-way checkpoint we again had regrouped to a crew of 10+ riders with just 3 or 4 of us up front doing the work. It was on a long flat section here that my Dad decided to take a pull; unfortunately he picked a section of exposed road along a very open marshy river with a strong headwind. He ended up burning himself out and as he slid off the front he wasn't able to hang on. At this point the group really faded, it was just Dave, another shop rider and myself. From here to the last check in at mile 71 Dave and I took turns pulling. Despite the fact that it was just Dave and I doing the work we were able to keep an aggressive 22-24 mile an hour pace. This was a really fun section of road with some slightly rolling hills, with a bigger group to work with this section could have been really fast! I ran out of water, at about mile 67 or so and really needed the last check in. As we pulled into the stop we had worked our way up to the front of the ride, there was just a 50 or so riders at the check in at that point. I topped off the waters and grabbed a quick bit to eat; just in time to see my dad roll in. As my dad was topping off his water Dave and the other shop rider asked if I wanted to head out again, but I decided to hold back and finish with my dad.

So my dad and I headed out for the last 30 miles, at this point I kept an easy high teens pace. It wasn't too long before we had another pace line going. I needed some help and wheel-sucked for about 5 miles, that gave me the rest I needed. I then pulled the group along for a few miles but as soon as we hit a slight grade I started to drop guys. For the last 14 miles or so the group was reduced to just 3 riders. Despite the fact that this ride is called TFCE it does end on the biggest hill of the day. I like hills, so knowing how close I was to the finish with just a short hill in front of me I let loose and sprinted in to the finish.

This was my first solid group ride and it was really fun. Most of my road rides are solo, after this ride I know how much more efficient and fun riding in a team can be. For a ride that I wasn't really looking forward to, it turned out to be a lot of fun.

Distance 103.2
Overall time: 5:31.36
Ride time: 4:56.19 (under 5 hours!)
Max Speed: 35.5
Ave Speed: 20.9

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