On Feb 5th Michelle put on her 4th Annual New Years Diet. What a great event. Lot’s of navigation, slick ice covered snow to ride on, and everything exactly where it should be. This Diet was better run than some of the races out there. Special thanks to Andy and Ronny for pre-running the course the week prior; and all the TeamHalfwayThere.com volunteers that ensured there was hot food and a fire at the TA’s.
This was a 12 hour event at the Little Fort Recreation Area in Woodstock Tower VA. The weather was about 25-35 degrees throughout the event. We started on foot, gained some elevation and bagged some points. Back to the start/finish and off on our bikes. Joel from the ARMD team took an early lead and held onto it throughout the event. Brian from SOG and I spent most of the first bike section together a bit behind Joel.
That riding was tough! We spent a lot of time pushing up slick hills. Sometime mid-morning it rained and then everything got a nice coat of ice on it. At one point, spun the rear tire riding up a hill, got both feet on the ground straddling the bike and slid backwards and sideways downhill completely out of control. Wow. Under that thin coat of ice and a crust on the snow was some “sugar” snow making slow going. So, the fastest line was the slickest…until you fell. I am hoping to get back out on some of those trails once the ground is clear. Should be much faster going next time.
We rolled into the next TA, moved some gear around, talked with the volunteers (thanks again to Cathy and Paul) and moved out on the foot section. Brian ran up the mountain, I looked for a road that didn’t exist and ended up rollin’ with Joel for awhile. He was a whole CP ahead of me, and wasn’t making errors. We parted ways as I tried (successfully) to move faster than I was navigating. Early afternoon and I am back at the TA. Lukas (TeamHalfwayThere.com rockstar) was about to move out on bike, so we left together.
If we were racing, we would have stayed on the pavement and taken the long way around to the next CP’s. We were training, so we pedaled, slid and pushed our scoots down the dirt double-track moving at 3.5 to 5.2 kph. Definitely slow going, and definitely a memorable time. Killer scenery and challenging terrain. We got to the final downhill single track as the sun was setting. We descended to the pavement and out of nowhere a a freak storm hit us. One minute it was the soft light of a setting sun at dusk. The next minute it was completely black with gale force winds, pelting sleet and driving snow. Within ten minutes it seemingly spent all its energy and was over. Crazy!
Lukas and I continued traveling together, wrapped up the remaining bike points and headed to the finish. What an awesome day. It was a good shakeout for my recently healed toe. A bit of pain, some swelling, but nothing really debilitating. I switched to a 2×9 setup on my Dos Niner. I went with a 38 and 22 front chainring set. I know, too much throw for the front derailleur. Unfortunately, it really was. This was an excellent usable gearing combination. The shifts from the large to the small ring were great. However the shifts from the small to the large took an excessive amount of coaxing. I have switched to 36 and 22 now, and will experiment with ramped/pinned rings next. I really like using the front larger ring for the majority of situations and having the 22 as a bail out. 2 x 10 in the future???
In the end, I think only three of us cleared the entire course. Joel smoked all of us, with Brian hot on his heels. A great day of training, and shared memorable experiences outside with friends.
See you outside,
Shane
thanks for the race write up shane. glad you had a good day of training.