I’ve decided to institute a new feature here at the Chainline: a photo of the day. Although the blog’s focus has been cycling of late, I can’t forget that my other (and probably primary) hobby is photography. I plan to take my camera with me when I go to Durango next weekend, and hopefully get a few good racing shots (though not during my race) and maybe some landscapes/scenics as well. So, without further adieu, here is the first shot in the new feature. I went to the exotic locale of my backyard and shot some of the “wildlife.” Enjoy!

Well, we’re down to a week until I leave for Durango, and just 9 days until the race! Overall, I feel pretty good. Fitness wise, I think I have prepared and trained about as well as I can. My last “test” was to ride Lookout (yet again) on Tuesday, and I set a new personal best (yet again)! I rode the 4.7 mile climb in 24 minutes 45 seconds, and the icing on that cake is that I beat Ty! Only by a bike length (if that), but it still counts! The closest I’ve been prior to Tuesday was down 45 seconds, so to stay with him the whole way was huge. Anyway, I’m getting pretty excited for next weekend. I was getting pretty nervous, but I’m really just psyched to have a great weekend in Durango, and not worrying about the race too much.

…what someone can do with a bike these days. Check out this vid…

Check this out for pictures of the modern day “chariot race” held in Rome for the city’s 2762nd birthday. Pretty crazy…

Chariot Races

Today we rode Lookout Mountain for the 4th time (5th actual climb) in the last two weeks. Are we masochistic? Maybe, but it’s good training for the upcoming hill climb race (May 2) and the Iron Horse (May 23). I was excited tonight because, despite riding after a full day of work, I set a new personal best time of 25:10, which is a whole 50 seconds over my previous best time (set Tuesday)! I have no idea what I did differently; I typically get off work in a dehydrated and malnourished state. Hopefully I can figure it out so I can at least duplicate if not improve upon the result! Anyway, it was getting dark so we just rode to Boetcher Mansion and back down. Here’s a picture (crappy iphone quality, unfortunately) from the top…

Did another lap of Lookout Mountain yesterday after work. All things considered, the legs felt really good on the climb, and it at least seemed like I was pushing my pace. Topped out at 26:00, so a new personal best, but still not where I’d like to be. Upper stretches of the mountain still had quite a bit of snow from last weekend’s storm, though the road was pretty clear. I also saw several broken and downed trees up there. We continued down to Highway 40 and looped back on Paradise Road, which is a very steep but short climb. One thing I did notice is that I seemed to not really settle into a rhythm I thought I could maintain until about 1/3 of the way up the climb. I think I definitely need to do better warmups then I have been doing so get the heart rate up and the blood flowing before tackling hills like this. The first third of the climb was pretty painful until my muscles were warm.

Well, the main objective (the Iron Horse Classic) is officially only one month away. I have to resist the temptation to over-train as the day draws nearer. After 4 months of training so far, I should be able to take it easy the last couple of weeks and try to keep my legs as fresh as possible. Maybe a few light, fun spins to keep the fitness up? We’ll see how it goes…

There’s gotta be some sort of penalty for that…

Sorry it’s been awhile. I’m still not used to this regular updating thing.

The spring weather has been wreaking havoc with our training for the Iron Horse. In the last month, I’ve ridden outside a grand total of twice. Don’t get me wrong, we’ve been putting in some major time (well, as much as possible without losing sanity) on the indoor trainers, but there is really no substitute for riding on the road (or trails) and putting in the miles. On the plus side, our two outdoor rides both included climbing Lookout Mountain, and I am climbing it better than I ever have before. Prior to this season, my best time up the 4.5 mile, 1600′ elevation gain climb was upwards of 28 minutes. In three total climbs this year, I’ve done 26:05, 27:15, and 27:45 (the last time was after working two long shifts with only 5 hours break in between). The reason for the heavy Lookout training recently is the upcoming Lookout Mountain Hill Climb race, which is on May 2. Ty and I will be racing in Cat 4 (required for first time racers, not that I would be looking to race any other category anyway), and it should be a good fitness test and warmup race for the Iron Horse. Of course, I looked up last year’s results, and the winner of Cat 4 did the climb in 19 minutes! Yeah, we’re gonna get smoked…

In other news, there is a very well written article in the May 09 issue of Bike Magazine about the ongoing struggle between wilderness conservation and trail use, which appears to be coming to a head in Montana. As both a supporter of the ideal of wilderness protection and an avid mountain biker, I am divided on this issue, and tend to see validity on both sides of the argument. The problem is that the Forest Service has it’s hands tied in many ways, and I do not envy the job of trying to juggle all the different land uses with the need to protect the land against degradation. Basically, there are several areas in Montana (and in several other states) which have been recommended for Wilderness designation (under the 1964 Wilderness Act), but only Congress can actually put this recommendation into law. Some of these areas have been in limbo for 20 years and have not been officially designated yet, thanks to the snail-like pace of the bureaucracy. The Forest Service has been trying to figure out how best to manage these lands, whether as National Forest or with the extra protections that come along with Wilderness. Ultimately, they decided that to best follow their mission, the Wilderness recommended areas should be managed as the Wildernesses they are waiting to be, which means no bikes. We’ll see how this turns out, but the implication seems to be that several thousand acres of these areas could have these same management rules enacted, meaning the loss of hundreds of miles of trails to mountain bikers.

Of course, there is the related argument of bikes in the wilderness, but that is for another day…

Well it took until the end of March, but winter has come at last to the Front Range. Although the trees and plants could really use the moisture (and even with all this snow we are still way below average for the year), it’s annoying to have to restrict my training to the indoors. I rode outside every weekend in January and February, and now I’m stuck inside. Luckily this spring snow never seems to stick around for very long, and hopefully the roads and trails will be rideable soon. It’s less than 2 months until the Iron Horse and I still need to put in some quality miles to get ready!

Distance Ridden: 12 miles

Elevation Gain: 2,212 feet

With so many long and intense road rides these past few weeks, my buddy, Ty, and I opted for something different this week. Neither of us had ridden at Lair o’ the Bear park, but we had each heard good things, and my interest had been piqued when we rode past the upper trailhead on Parmalee Gulch road last week. Plus, my mountain bike was collecting dust in the garage and feeling quite neglected, so I decided it was time to take it out for a spin.

Lair O’ The Bear is along Highway 74 between Morrison and Evergreen, and is a park administered by Jefferson County Open Space. I should note that the park itself only contains the first mile and a half of trail, which then proceeds through open space owned by the City of Denver before ending at Pence Park, which is another Jeffco Park.

The first mile or so is a wide multi-use trail that follows Bear Creek. It then turns sharply uphill and climbs steadily for a few miles before a few short but fun descents and another steady climb up to the top where it meets Parmalee Gulch Road. The trail is quite smooth compared with other Front Range trails (Apex, White Ranch, etc) and I felt really good on the climb. A couple technical sections keep you honest as you climb (I had to walk a couple of them). Maybe it’s the fact that I’m in better shape for March than I ever have been in my life, but I didn’t feel that the climb was too hard at all. You definitely earn the descent though, which is well worth it. The top couple of miles are just fun, flowy singletrack. When we started down, we didn’t see anybody so we could really bomb down the trail. A couple short climbs punctuate the descent (along with the tech sections), and on the lower half we started seeing a LOT of people (cyclists and hikers) heading up (it was a 70 degree day in mid March so that was to be expected). A word of advice, if you’re planning on riding or hiking at Lair O’ The Bear on a weekend, get there early. We returned to a packed parking lot (we were the 5th car to arrive this morning) and headed back down the hill.

Overall, Lair O’ The Bear was a very fun trail. It wasn’t too difficult (except for the few sections) and the descent was well worth the climb. The thing I liked most is that it wasn’t so steep and/or technical that it just became frustrating (like Apex, per se) and I could enjoy myself a lot more. The trail definitely whetted my appetite for mountain biking and left me yearning for the high country trails to dry out so I could ride them. Guess I’ll have to wait for summer.