Damn. That was quick

Registration for the Dirty Kanza 200 opened last night at 11:01 PM CST. The field of 150 riders (expanded to 160) was filled in right around 12 hours. I was fortunate enough to get in for the third year in a row. Looking over the confirmed rider list, I see a lot of strong riders. I expect that the eventual winner will have been run through the wringer by the time he or she crosses the finish line. Since the race is a week later, I'm expecting it to be even hotter than last year. Then again, we could just as easily be treated to rain and softball sized hail too. Regardless of the conditions, I'm looking forward to making the trip to Emporia again in early June.

Starting the year off right

Up at 6:15 AM on New Year's Day. Met a group at Hy-Vee on the corner of 74th and University for breakfast and then off to Steve and Nancy's place for a 2 hour spin on the trailer with eight other people. Good way to start the year. I still despise trainers.

50 miles of smiles

Met up with Squirrel and Jordan for some "urban" putt-putt this morning. Left the house at 9 AM with a thermos of coffee and a flask of whiskey in my camelback in case we got cold while riding around. Boogied downtown on the pave trail, talked briefly to Luggs and Mike Baker and then hurried downtown. Heck of a good time was had by all of us. We rode along the south side of the river amongst the trees, the homemade shelters of the homeless, as well as some quad play ground. We found a handy route across the river courtesy of Union Pacific and proceeded to ride around and explore the north side of the river and the bottoms. We discovered lots of well maintained quad playground and proceeded to just have a hell of a good time riding the double track, railing berms and popping up and over some fun whoop-de-doos near the levees. We finally hit a spot where the quad playground came to and end and had to turn around and head back. Stopped at El Bait Shop for 30 minutes for a burrito and a couple of beers (I went with the Rogue Smoked Porter). Squirrel and I rode home along the north side of the Raccoon river, through Lost Planet and then back to Waterworks park. I took side streets over towards 100th in Clive and rode home. About 5.5 hours of riding time and 50 or so miles of fun. I never really noticed the "cold" once were moving. That's the sign of a good ride this time of year.

Sycamore 8

Spent four or five hours this morning helping out with the course setup and management for CITA's Sycamore 8 Trail Run. I woke up later than I intended this morning and had to hustle to make the setup meeting time at 7 AM. I was greeted by a flat front tire on my Karate Monkey so I grabbed a set of platform pedals and a pedal wrench and headed out with my Singlecross in the back of the truck. Riding Sycamore with the cross bike wasn't as bad as I thought. Definitely worked up a sweat while riding along some of the grassy sections near I-80, and also while moving some brush out of the way. My Salomon boots kept my feet warm, and the layers I put on kept my body warm. I did manage to pick the wrong gloves to wear and ended up with some cold hands while the race was actually in progress. Sycamore is in remarkably good shape right now (for Sycamore). The frozen ground makes for a fast ride through there. The bald eagles are out in force along the Des Moines River as well. Beautiful to see and cool to hear when they are roosting above you in the trees. Anyone that believes that an elevated highway through the middle of this area will have miniscule effect on the wildlife is sorely mistaken. Gonna bundle up tomorrow morning and ride some new trail with Squirrel on the east side of the river. Should be a good time.

Moonlight ride

Met up with some guys from the Rasmussen and All 9 Yards bike teams tonight for some gravel goodness. 5:30 PM, temps in the 50s (if we were lucky) and a nearly full moon made for good times. The group broke into two not too far into the ride with those of us out for base building taking a right, while those intent on world domination kept on going ahead. We never saw them again. RickB, KrisK, RickN, Chia-Chad, the RoBros, Lippold and myself headed off west towards what was supposed to be Van Meter. Kris and RickN headed south to Booneville as the rest of us continued west to Old Portland Road and then headed north. We eventually made it into Adel and rode the Raccoon River Valley Trail back into town. RickB and I jumped off in Clive and headed south back towards WaterWorks Park where we had parked. I got in 50 miles of good base in, with a couple of pips a bit higher climbing some of the hills. My Specialized Singlecross was a good choice tonight. No gears meant no way to do anything stupid. just kept ticking the pedals over to keep moving. My right IT band feels like it took a lead pipe to it. It's way too sore to do anything with tonight. If it feels good tomorrow, I'll do a light foam roller session to work the tight spots out.

...And so begins "training" for the 2010 season.

Announcement - Steve Fuller 40th Anniversary Tour 2010

CIRREM
Ragnarok 105
Trans-Iowa v6
Almanzo 100
Dirty Kanza 200
Farmhouse Classic
Flint Hills Death Ride
GLGA
24 Hours of Seven Oaks
Heck of the North

Time to start training.

CITA's Ales and Trails 2009

Spent Friday night through early Sunday afternoon at Whiterock Conservancy for CITA's second Ales and Trails event. Whiterock is 4300 contiguous acres of oak savannah, prairie, and farmland near Coon Rapids, Iowa. If you are a fan of the outdoors you owe it to yourself to spend some time there. We filled our weekend with camping, mountain biking, a 45 mile gravel road race, a few beers and an evening concert in the riverside barn by Des Moines' ownBrother Trucker.

The gravel road race on Saturday was a lot of fun, if a bit brutal. Squirrel managed to build a course where the B-road sections were the fastest thing we would ride on all day. Very few sections of flat, and a southerly course with a SE wind. After what I thought was a good start, hanging with Dave Lippold to the top of the climb we hit right out of the start, my legs just pretty much gave out. I couldn't get into a rhythm on the climbs and just couldn't get my legs to spin up the way I wanted. Squirrel and I stopped for a mid ride beer at Sammy's car, about 10 minutes behind Dave, and decided to just push in together and try to wrap up second and third spots. Squirrel just dieseled his way along and I yo-yo'd behind on the climbs and caught up on the downhills and on the flats. I had to finally let Squirrel go with about 5 miles or so left and just finish the race out. I ended up finishing in about 3 hours and change. I felt worse after those 45 miles than I did after the 10+ hours of the GLGA a month ago.

On Sunday, Matt McCutchen, Brian Sheesley and I took off after breakfast and spent the next couple of hours just riding around on the double track through Whiterock, taking in the scenery and just having a good time. Screaming fast downhills and some long climbs greeted us almost all of the way into Coon Rapids. On the way back, Brian and I took a different path back that involved some rough pasture land, cows, and barbed wire fence crossings. I hit something in the pasture and developed a slow leak once we were on the gravel back to Whiterock. A quick hit with the CO2 cartridge got me back to the truck and, after a change of clothes, on my way home.

I, and everyone else. had a lot of fun at this years Ales and Trails event. It would have been good to have had more people in attendance. I'm not sure if it's the location, the drive, or something else that prevented us from having more people show up. Hopefully we can increase the number of people, and the fun, for next year's event.