Ohio Cycling Disorder (OCD)

FTP Course for the past 3+ years in the CVNP. FTP, for those unfamiliar with this cycling acronym, stands for Functional Threshold Power . It is used by cyclists worldwide and represents one's ability to sustain the highest possible power output for 45 to 60 minutes whether you are a trained athlete or not. I have never performed a 45 to 60 minutes test and opt to take a 20-ish minute test on an 8-mile course with 5-miles of the flat-ish road followed by a 3-mile climb. To calculate the FTP value for my effort, 95% of the average power output over 20-minutes is used. I have taken this test many times and I always stress out about it. Why? I really don't know. It's not like this number makes me a better or worse person. It's just a number. Regardless, I tend to get worked up over it days before the test. I stress a lot over the little stuff. Something to work on I suppose. TrainingPeaks showing the week prior to the week of the test. I wasn't stoked to ...

El Capitan (Tony) watching over his new backyard playground. The last few years I have helped tow the line at the NUE season opener (mostly pulling up the slack at the back), the True Grit Epic 100 in Santa Clara, UT. This being my fourth time was extra special because several teammates came out to join the fun and wrap a bit of Rescue Racing Team camaraderie around the race. I rarely get to spend time with these shred-tastic individuals and was beyond stoked to get to hang out, race, and explore new trails. I had my bike shipped to Red Rock Bicycles (an awesome and rad bunch of folks!!) via BikeFlights.com  and flew to St. George on Tuesday before the race and, again, through the generosity of a truly great friend, training partner, and teammate, Dave Jolin, got to spend time relaxing at his place. I'd say we did a tad bit of riding over the span of the entire week. It pretty much looked like this: Tuesday : Shred some Zen Trail x2 (~12-miles w/ ~1900' of elev...

Its been a tough block for me. This being my third training block since my "off season" in the fall of 2018 where I had no plans from das'coach but just my own thang. Translation - I could trash my legs day in and day out and not care ... mostly. I just love to ride and run and with no races slated after Marji Gesick 100, other than Bill's Bad Ass 50k in November, I just road and ran every day. Heading into this third and final week of a LAT block after having put down a fairly decent time at the Snake Creek Gap #2 race and earning a third-place spot on the podium I knew this week would be a tough one. The biggest ride for the week would be a 5-hour ride on the fixie but I had made an executive decision to ride the new rig for this ride. I have not put much time in on the new bike and well ... I want to make sure I have a good fit on it and to work out any possible kinks before heading to the True Grit Epic 100 in the beginning of March in St. George, UT (one of ...

Bills Bad Ass 50k , a local trail race, has been well known to dish out the pain not only because the route basically ebbs and flows in and out of a valley, but since it is held in Ohio and in November you can guarantee that the weather will dish out some of Mother Nature's finest work. She did not disappoint this year, the 10th and last time the race will be run, unfortunately. I knew full well it would be cold and wet when I woke up Saturday morning (11/10) but wasn't quite expecting to see a blanket of snow on the ground with the temperature hovering at 24*. Ooof ... hello Winter ... nice to see you took Fall out back and took it out of commision. So that's the way it's gonna be, eh? Well, screw you and the sleigh you slide in on! Woke u early, thru some grub down the hatch, jumped in the care and quite literally slide my way to packet pickup. One nice thing about this being a local race is that my drive time is all of about 10-minutes. Grabbed my bib + shirt an...

Start/Finish line was on point! I have raced several 6-hour lap races in the past but never a duo race where you team up with a fellow MTBer and swap laps. My good friend, training partner, and Rescue Racing teammate called me out to see if I was at all interested in racing the Twain Reign of Pain Duo 6.5 hour race with him. It took me a good amount to deep thought to finally decide that I was willing to race with him. All 6-hour races are hard, but the difference maker in a Duo format race, and at least in my humble opinion, is the downtime when you are not shredding singletrack but waiting for your partner to finish their lap. That downtime is my biggest concern and as I heard and chatted with other racers is definitely one of the top 3 concerns that racers are lamenting over. Do you sit? Do spin? When do you warm your legs up again all while not overdoing it and no missing your teammate hit the finish line when you had better be ready to tag and GO! Being inquisitive an...