Race Report or "how to attempt to sabotage your own race"

Joe, Javid and I keeping the race moving along.
photo from thepurplewing.com


I haven't done much pedal bike racing this year. PMBAR, a SERC event at my local trails and the BMW River Gorge Omnium (Road Race, Time Trial and Criterium).

The interested reader can scroll down and read about our epic day of riding in Pisgah during the PMBAR event.
My friend and now pro mountain bike racer James Williams came into town for a visit and urged me to race the SERC event at Raccoon Mountain. I did my best to sabotage my own race by 1. racing in the single speed class, 2. changing my 20t cog for a 19t cog before the race 3. converting my tires to tubeless the night before the race. 4. drinkin' brews
None of these efforts resulted in a mechanical allowing me to leave the 96 degree F race course for some shade, water and more brews. I finished the race in 10th place. I think it took about 3 hours of solid water consumption before I could pee and probably a good week to get re-hydrated again.
I continued NOT training by sleeping late, staying up late, working on my house and drinking throughout the rest of the season.

As the River Gorge event crept up on me, I tried to increase my riding but it was really to late to accomplish anything other than to convince myself I could at least ride the race course without having to stop for a break. The Grubbs brothers, Corey Hall and I went for a ride on the course. We pounded out the first 2/3 rds fast, when we hit the stair step I fell off the back. This was enough to realize I need to upgrade my fitness. After resisting as best I could, using my poor performance as an excuse, Javid and Joe got me to sign up with promises to pull me the whole way to the base of the big climb up Racoon Mountain. Instead we were at the front of the race, driving the pace some and making poor attempts to attack on the flats. Big bad Randy was even going to pull us through the flats but I never saw him again until the Crit on Sunday.
At the start of the final climb I got out front and held as long as I could, finally a group of 10 passed me and slowly widened the gap between me and them. At the second to last steep pitch I picked off a rider. Joe caught up with me on the short down hill but I was able to accelerate past him up the last pitch to the finish for 9th. The time trial started about 4 hours later, we had some time to relax. The brothers Grubbs and I went back to my house to eat pizza, drink some beer and watch Army of Darkness, the third movie in the Evil Dead series. I think I read somewhere that this was the proper way to prepare for a time trial.
After we finished our beers we headed back up to the mountain for the time trial. I was the first one off. My legs felt weary from the road race and I thought it would have been nice to have a TT bike to allow me to utilize some different muscles, but it also gave me strong sense of pride to be one of the few racing cannibal style. Just as I started a storm was starting to roll in, there were some good winds in front of the storm as rolled in. I like to think that being slower than last years time was a result of the winds but it could have been the Evil Dead or maybe the beer. I missed 10th place by about 1 second. Joe was wearing his funny helmet as he passed his 30 second man, Javid, for second place.
Sunday morning was the criterium race. It was mine and Javid's first race of this kind. I was concerned that some sketchy bike handling CAT 5 racer was going to take me out, but for the most part everyone raced smooth. There were a few fresh legs out there, mostly Team Krystal riders who looked like they weren't the type that would have enjoyed the climbing on the road course. The pace was good, throughout. They had enough primes to keep the sprints going. Joe won at least two of them. I got out in the front after one of the primes because the pace was slowing too much and pulled the group around . I think Randy got away with 1 or 2 laps to go and Team Krystal slowed the pace down effectivly blocking, I didn't even realize he was away. I was caught up in the middle of the pack. I should have been up front for the last 3 laps, then I may have been able to do something. I came in with the pack and sprinted for 9th place, almost being taken at the line but was just able to hold the other rider off.

Eight Days in the Middle Kings

Leisure Tour '09



Gambling on the dates that the water would be good we bought plane tickets to Fresno (shizblarnigan #1) to set out for the Middle Fork of the Kings. We almost got the flow right this time. After paddling the river at high water in 2005 (the flow peaked at 2200 cfs on the Roger's Crossing gauge) we were looking for a low water descent. Hoping to put on at 1250 and have the river drop, we ended up with flows holding steady around 1350cfs, I think this would be considered medium flows. Our plan was to take our time and enjoy being in the canyon as long as possible. Three groups passed us while we were on the river. The first came through with those wild eyes on a mission to get out quickly and be somewhere else, the next we juggled back and forth with as they spent time patching boats but a well planned day off allowed us to get behind them by a day. The final group came upon us while in Tehipiti Valley and only taking an extra long lunch on the Garlic Falls section allowed us to fall behind this group. You may be thinking "Wait, I thought to be a bad ass kayaker you have to bomb the run and be the first ones off the water, training for the green race everytime you paddle." Sure that's fun, but what are you missing?



Getting ready, practicing "HighFive!"



Bryce in front of the Inconsolable Range



LeConte Canyon



Product shot: I show off my Pyrahna Burn and Werner, Tim grabs his nuts, Broiler shots the bird. These are the photos that can get you free gear.


Some early mank





"Meet my right and my left"


As we appeared to the other groups kayaking the river, sitting on the bank in Arab fashion, although Tim is sporting more of the mammy look here



Domes


While the other group repaired their boats, we did this:




Where I got hammered in '05, which is just below where The Broiler was hammered this year, and right above where Helms and DeLa were hammered several years ago.


Some Class III in the Bottom 9
More Leisure Time




Previous high water trip in '05


Notice how much more sunny and happy this trip was...




Team Jib's exclusive California Highway Patrol escort into the fire zone... no shit, I'm serious.



Just like the Little Dutch boy at the dyke Bryce plugs the hole in the tire with his finger... The Broiler, with his hands on his head, wonders if the shizblarnigans will ever cease.

for a great summer read

Mayhem Part I

All Hail Cron! The rains have returned!


May has proven to be one of the wettest months that the SE has seen in at least half a decade. The action started off with a skunking at Pocket Creek into a mission on a lesser run "jewel" known as Stone Coal Bank Creek. There was plenty of water, but only a short stretch of three point five uber-gnarly burlefesters. We chose to probe the first of said three and opted for the high line round the other two due to instantious decapitation consequences.

Here is Captain Kirk looking for the bottom

Caleb in flight

The next morning we returned to the greater Chattanooga area with Pocket Creek in mind once again, but The Bear was 16" and rising, so we decided to take the bird in hand. Putting on The Bear whilst it rains at 16" can be a Hair raising experience. The water finally caught up with us around Revelations, just in time for the hardest part of the run. You know it was scary when the cameras stay dry. Charge.

The next day it was back to Rock City for some more LLTrust action. We had an enormous group, but thanks to our previous days warm up, our ninja skills were already on the razor's edge.

Will Chargit Pruett



Howard Tidwell, West Prong Legend, forgot his lifejacket

If you're into evil you're a friend of mine

Cloudland Canyon has an incredible tractor beam on it at times. After a day off it was back to the Bear for a solid 15 incher. For reference I will send you to Paul's headcam footy posted previously...

Stairway sans paddler

Back to Chatty. Next day. Time for some bday margignar on downtown Signal Mtn. I've been thinking about this one since I heard tale of Ralphy's last decent. We got in there at around 1 foot, and it was not enough water. The kayaking in there is fringe. There are some really good drops and some really scary ones. Bring your nutsack. It needs a little cleaning and 4 -5 more inches of water before I go back. Trip highlight was definetly my subterranean swim out of 9mm. No one fired up Superman.

Rainbow Falls could be oh so good

Kirk and Caleb above Sierra

Caleb in the ultra tech seal line at Sierra Slide

Clay and his crew member

These drops would be awesome with more water

The week was rounded out by what my have been the "second successful descent" of the Trail Fork of Big Creek. Tony and Kirk put a good bit a of work into this one, and I'll be damned if they didn't finally find something worth a damn. Those who dare will be rewarded greatly by 500 ft/mile for two miles, if you can catch it. Stupid fun, but watch for wood.

Part I of the opening set "Ernesto"

Mikey's sickass mystery sequence

Penalty Box, low light, bad pocket hole

Link Up

Paul put together this headcam footage of some of the drops in Bear Creek:




Below Neil gives Zoltan a run for his money:

Photos: Ted Hayes
Rescue: Paul

Survival Mode

The first weekend of survival mode started with Jerry's Baddle a combination kayak and bike race in the Green River gorge. Its always fun to paddle the Green and see the NC folks.

I was pretty slow in the kayak but for being in a short boat where most everyone that places well uses a long boat I felt ok with my time. I got the second fastest bike time.
Cory Hall made up a ton of time on the river and passed me in the flats after the standard takeout. I caught him toward the end of the bike ride and we were able to work together through the false flats and headwinds on the last portion of the course. Cory took second place. Javid beat my total time by 4 seconds. Everyone that raced the "Greenman" from Chattanooga took finishes in the top 10.
View the results here: RESULTS

The following week we got a little more rain and got some runs in on Suck Creek with good water. I tried to do a little bike training when I wasn't working or boating to get ready for PMBAR This year was my second year doing the event. We try to stay laid back and not blow our wad early in the race. Alex and I seemed to pick a route that almost no one else was doing, which was fine with us but I believe we put in more miles than we needed to.

Our route was something like this:
blk mtn> Buckhorn Gap> 476 > FS 5018 > Horse Cove Gap> Cantrell Cr > S Mills> Bradley Cr> FS 5015 (to Yellow Gap) > FS1206 > FS 5000> FS1206> Laurel Mt > Pilot Rock > FS 1206> HWY 276> FS 5041> 475 B> FS 225> 475 B> 5041> 276> FS 477> 5058> 5022> Black Mtn> Finish



It took us around 13hrs. We rode around 80 miles in Pisgah and completed all the check points. We finished late and stayed the night in Brevard at Nate E's house.

After waking up and having a huge breakfast at The Barrel I made my way back to Chattanooga where I headed straight to Bear Creek. The Bear was at 24" so we ate some more food, hiked around Cloudland Canyon and generally wasted time until it dropped down to about 20-20.5" and put on late in the day. I was exhausted from the Pisgah race and almost opted out but couldn't pass up on the opportunity to paddle The Bear. I knew that I didn't have the energy to handle a major beat down but that at 20+" the chance that there would be some action was high. We headed down stream and we ran Surrealistic Pillow for the first time in a couple of years. At Fishbowl I headed for the left line and didn't quite get left of a small piece of flow so I missed the boof and augered in deep. I resurfaced on a back ender that moved me toward the center of the hole. From there I had a few window shades and back enders and decided to pull while I still had a little energy. I swam for the surface but couldn't get there, I went for about 2 recircs before I came up and was able to swim over to the ledge on the left. Bryce got my boat on river right and my paddle floated right over to me. I got my shit back together quick and we blazed into Knocking on Heavens Door> Stairway to Heaven> Cosmic Trigger> Big Bang

I needed a rest day on Monday but went back to the Bear after work and caught it still running at a low but fun 8". I met Clay W. over there and we paddled with Jeff W and Dave L. who were doing their 7th lap. Tuesday Suck Creek held all day long at around 4.8-4.6' so I headed over there after work. . Rain again on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning brought The Bear back up to 15". Again I headed over after work and had a great day, catching it around 14" which was just what I needed to get my head right about that run after my swim over the weekend. I plan on doing some resting tonight and it looks like more rain on the horizon but what I should really be doing is working on my house...

April Showers

steeper than it looks, down the gut of Rock Creek, Lookout Mountain

Rain has consistently been in the forecast here in East Tennessee, and its apparent in things like relationships, to-do lists, and other "responsibilities". Water off a ducks back you might say, because its been nothing short of a chargefest 'round here. Last weekend tKnoxville made it over to Mr. Watty's for a little adventure kayaking. They hiked over the mountain and pulled a big scoooooop on all the other boaters that showed up at Anaconda just in time to watch 'em charge 'er down the gut, no scout. No time for pictures. "Hiking over from the Straight Fork is the only way to go." -N. Helms

This weekend it was a little "after" work West Prong Friday, followed by an alpine start on a Lookout Mountain "gem" into Classic Cain mission Saturday.

Insurance Bluff



Rain Lankin back in action

Lovely Lula Lake Falls: Big ups to the Land Trust

"How many portages did you do?" -Lane


backyard stomping ground

fully charged from the warm-up

Rock Creek warm-up

Rock Creek has been off the radar screen for most Chatt. boaters for a long time. Bryce and Brent went in for the first decent around 10 years ago and never reported that there was much too it. It took a Knoxville boater going back in on a solo mission to really open the eyes of everyone of the quality of the run. Access is on private land and permission is easy to get, but required before going into this creek. The land managers have been very open to the idea of having kayakers as an additional user group here. Rock Creek has probably seen more decents in the past two weeks than it has over the past 10 years. It is a steep but relativly clean run, but still reminds the paddler of runs like Middle Creek and North Pole. The only requests of the land managers thus far is to stay low key, small groups (which I think we are pushing altely) and don't get hurt.

I have been trying to stay off Suck Creek lately opting instead to get after work runs in on Cain> North Chick. which is classic and allows for more of a river running experience by offering the possiblility to stay in the boat for 9 to 10 miles rather than short 1 mile laps.
T. Martin you still owe me a booty beer, don't think I am going to forget or let it slide! Your photo will be on this blog soon enough.

he's gonna be a daddy soon

Of Boojum and Bicycles

Back from the desert with all fingers and toes attached. Started the trip off with a Hueco crushing sesh with the Danimal into tequila sipping at secret radium hotsprings. Drove to San Diego for crew rendevous, then pushed the muff for about 700 miles from Ensenada to Loreto all detours included. With the additional "blue blazing", we made it from San Diego, California, United States of America to La Paz, Baja California, Sur, Mexico in 19 days. Highlights include our all day ride into 30 mph headwinds in the high desert plains, secluded beach camping with natural, tidal hotsprings, the start-up of Crusher Industries (look for the spring line-up "Photo-op One" to be dropping in department stores too soon), and new prophetic incarnations of the prophet boojum, who is not. who is. who. (insert elightenment).

Click here for the full photo spread from eye of Rodson