Visual Aids

Pics from this weekend. Its hard to pick myself out of the photo galleries in all black...
School is almost over. Problem is...it can't over soon enough. And the weather.com is forecasting rain for the next week and a half. Has that ever happened before? Lewis Black would call that an emergency condition.

When did XC's turn into short track?

If Harlan's comment about 100-milers being undistinguishable from a cross country start is true, then the same effect must be trickling down to the cross country races lately which have closely resembled this:



Greenbrier was Sunday and it hurt. Lots of rain the night before made for an extra schloppy course for us kiddies to play around in. The field was stacked as expected- several Trek riders, Harlan Price, Brandon, Kyle and a handful of other no-joke guys. The start was pretty quick, which I have no choice but to take credit for. I passed Jeff Shalk just before the biggest climb of the course and picked the pace up a little to try and get a lead group going. At the end of the first lap it was myself, Jeff, Harlan, and Kyle with Brandon just a few seconds back. Laps 2 and 3 we held the same pace and put more time between us and the rest of the field. Starting lap 4, Kyle and I starting coming off the back of the group and were passed by Eatough who had a first lap flat. I was able to get past Kyle on the 5th and final lap for 4th place, behind the two Trek guys and Harlan. One of my best results to date.
Brief Results:
1. Jeff Shalk
2. Chris Eatough
3. Harlan Price
4. Aaron Snyder
5. Kyle Hammaker
6. Brandon Draugelis

The bike was awesome, it climbed and accelerated so well I couldn't beleive it. The handling was about 95% today after some suspension and stem adjustments. I think a few more rides on the bike will bump it up to 100. Plus the yellow and black just looks plain sexy. This coming weekend is the first big double-header of the year. Cat Classic on Saturday with the first Michuax 50-miler on Sunday. Chris and Harlan are expected to be at both so come prepared.
This weeks bike practice called for a couple sets of superman's down the hallway
Tomorrow night, the 29th, is the opening night for the Bear Creek Short Track Series Presented by South Mountain Cycles. Registration opens around 5 or so, Beg/Sport race go off at 6pm and Expert at 6:30. If you think you've got something better to do, there's nothing better than short track. Except a short track that lasts for 2.5 hours like yesterday... Seriously, it'll be fun.

Saddle dropping and seatmast trimming

The old adage measure twice cut once was made into an extreme example this week as I took a hacksaw to the seatmast of the Scott. Rather then just cut it at a height that felt good, I paid a visit to Cyclefitters in Palmer and got a professional opinion on my saddle height and overall position on my bike. John set me up with cleat repositioning, saddle height at handlebar reach/drop. In the end he ended up lower my saddle by almost 3/4 of an inch. and moved my cleats out about 5mm on each foot to lower my q-factor. My reach looked pretty good the way I had it. We took those measurements and replecated them on the new Scale before chopping the post.

First thoughts are excellent. Super stiff, ultra light, and a suprisingly compliant rear end. I'm still getting the suspension tuned in and adjusting to the quicker head angle but hopefully that won't take long. As far as the fitting, it's only been a day or two on the new measurements, but the changes were noticable immediatially in John's studio. For years I've been riding the same saddle height based on what felt good. John told me that it's been too high and that has been over-extending my hamstrings which could be the reason for my cramping problems in past. After lowering it, my pedal stoke was visablly smoother and felt alot more comfortable. Only time will tell.

Last weekend was the second race in Zach Adams Y-Riders series. The course he had set up was pretty cool, some new raw trails plus some tight and technical sections made a challenging loop. The only problem was the turnout for the event. I'm guessing people just don't know about his races, but he puts on as good of an event as any other. So if your looking for some good racing check out his events.

The Playground Posse. We know fun when we see it. Tomorrow is Greenbrier, another stacked pro field expected.

I wish Jenny was here....

The ground beneath is nothing more than your point of veiw

Got the go ahead with a new bike sponsor of the 2008 season. This year I'll be cruising around on a new Scott Scale tricked out with an XTR group, Fox fork, and some sweet Stan's wheels. Just picked up the frame today along with a bunch of clothing and some miscellaneos stuff. I threw the frame on the scale as soon as I got back to the house today and the read-out was 2.1 lbs, with a foot and a half of seat mast sticking out. Once I get it cut down to length it should be sub 2lbs. Can't wait for the rest of the parts to come in later this week, cause I'm pysched to build this thing up and ride it.

Fair Hill was also this week. Suprised at how many people showed up because no one really talked about it all month. The Elite feild was the most stacked feild I can remember in a local race. 40 Pro/SemiPro/superfast expert riders! That plus a sub-90 minute race made for a painful day in the hurt locker. Jeff Shalk, Harlan, Chris Beck, and Kyle got out to an early lead after a couple small incidents back in the pack slowed us down. Brandon and I cleared the feild and worked hard to bridge up to the leaders by the end of the first lap. We sort of dangled there for the next two laps. Chris flatted and the two of us moved into 4th and 5th. Starting the final lap, Harlan must have felt like the pace wasn't high enough already, and shot through the feed zone for the holeshot into the woods. Brandon and I were still worked from the efforts to get back on and couldn't go with this time so we cruised the rest of the lap together. Jeff won the sprint with Harlan, Kyle pinned down a third place, and Brandon got a little time on me in the last minutes of the race for 4th and I rolled in 5th. Very happy. These MASS races have gotten to be no joke the past 2 seasons. Almost every one of them now is more like a mini-NORBA national rather than a local race. The competition is super stiff week in and week out which makes for some really interesting racing. Looking at the starting lineup before the race, I realized that even a top-10 wasn't going to be garanteed with the qualitly of riders that showed up. Thats some sweet racing.

Also got to race the new wheelset this weekend. They are quick!. Stan's Olympic 347's, DT24o hubs and Stan's rotors come together for a superlight race wheel that should hold up for a long time. The best part are the rotors. 59 grams, what!?!

PS.- Just noticed that the new frame has a 1.5 headtube on it. Which means I could have run a lefty...

Will the real [insert VisitPA.com team member name] please stand up...

Last year for the U.S. Open Team Relay our team out dressed the competition by miles. With the team name Three Minors and a Pedophile, and each bearing our own miscellaneous costums, no other team could touch us. At least in terms of creativity. Despite our get-up, the VisitPA.com team took the race win and forced us to take the second step on the podium. This year we upped the ante and took the costume competition to the next level. We had a reputation to live up to still more heads to turn. In leiu of last years shenanigans, Kuhn added a Best Costume Award for this years race, and we had our sights set on the 1, 2 dubb. Our idea was to immitate the exact people we were going to have to beat, to resemble each member of their team as closely as we could. Brandon kitted up, or maybe more accurately, stripped down, to be the one and only Flyin' Ryan Leech. In a last minute switch-up, Matt substituted Vegan Rob for the absent XRay Adams, and I took on the role of Zayne Braun Wes Schempf. Each of our outfits was carefully crafted using the highest quality materials available. I think they turned out pretty good.

Race Time. Lap 1: Me and Wes lead the field by a descent gap, but Wes puts about 20 seconds into me by the transition. Each following lap had more or less the same result. The real VisitPA team kept putting small chunks of time into us that just weren't able to pull back. Kyle put in the fastest laps of our team, and the race, but everytime he did we blew it and let slip away just a little bit more. In the end, we were about 5 minutes back and had 16 laps, and second overall. But......the handicap system that was put in place to level the playing field for the lower catergory teams put us in 6th place, officially. VisitPA was barely able to get in a 17th lap, coming into the transition a mere 20 seconds before the cut-off time. That lap made the difference with the point system the way it was, and they took the Team Cup once again.

Losing the actual race wasn't really that disapointing. The Team Relay has a real laid back setting to it, the outcome of the race isn't really the point. Sure, your there to race as hard as you can and try to come out to top, but it's more about having fun with the people that you spend every week trying to crush on the race course. What was devasting, however, was that the Best Costume Award, which we clearly secured at our time of arrival, was given away to another team. What?!?! The winning team wore corduroys and flannel shirts. That was soo last year.... If the award was given based on a popular vote, we most definitly would have been the undisputed champions, and in my book, we are anyway. It's a good thing there was a Taco Bell nearby to ease some of the pain...

Wes x2. Skin tones match almost perfectly...

The real Dieter covered up this time, normally he's just as scantily clad as his alias but he's always just as suave...

The amount of hair glued onto Matt's legs represents only a fraction of what is actually on Rob's body, unfortunately it's all that we had left after Brandon cut in his mullet


I wonder what we'll come up with for next year....

Fair Hill- 5 days, count it....

Editor's Note

One small over sight in the initial Pipestem race report. Joe "D" Draugelis made the trip over from "school" in Berkeley to check out the race and show some love for Matt and I. He deserves some love in return. Thanks Joe.