Race Report: XTERRA Gator Terra

It hurts me to write this. Literally. My hand is still very swollen and painful from my crash on Wednesday afternoon. I had Tuesday and Wednesday off work last week, so I decided to go to Pelham, AL, and do some pre-riding and training on the XTERRA Southeastern Championship course. I wanted to train just as much time as it took me to drive there and back. I didn't quite make it, but 6.5 hours for two days is still not bad. I rode the bike course three times and aced Blood Rock the last. That was pretty exciting. I swam in the lake twice and did more than the course there. The run course I struggled on a bit. I still couldn't find the new course that was supposed to remove some of the terrible hills this course is known for. I also walked most of it. I lost a lot of my steam on the last half mile of the bike course where I came into really sharp corner too hot and the front of my bike flew out from under me. My right hand braced my fall as I watched my fingers bend backwards as I flipped over. My knee got a pretty decent cut too. I can't believe I do all that riding over two days and make it through Blood Rock 3 times and past all the gnarly, rocky downhills and then I crash on the last two minutes of the bike in such an easy section of the trail. Although, I guess that is typical for me. The camping/training trip to Alabama was still a great one. I had a blast and those trails are so much fun to ride. I hope that remains my opinion after I race there next weekend, haha.

So, going into my first race of the season I have a badly damaged hand. I went to the doctor where he thankfully said it was not broken. I knew the only way I was not going to be racing was if he put a cast on it. So, when he said I had sprained my thumb and the rest was a hematoma that made it impossible to clinch my fist and turned my palm blue, I was ready to race as hard as my hand would let me. And I was hoping I could hang onto the handlebars well enough for the 10 mile ride.

I drove down to Ruston, Louisiana on Saturday afternoon with plans of getting there, riding the course, and then camping out. The park looked nothing like I remembered from the race I did there in 2005. Gator Terra 2005 was my first multi sport race I had ever done. It was pretty awesome to go back after 6 years and see how much progress I have made. The trail seemed completely different, but it was an awesome trail. The bike is really fast and fun with tons of different sections including switch backs, 33 mph downhills, fire roads, multiple creek crossing, tight single track, and several water bars to launch over. The pre-ride went well and my hand did as good as I could ask for. So, I packed up my stuff and headed over to the camp sites.

After setting up camp, I headed over to the bathhouse for a shower. The temperature was starting to drop quickly and I could see many people were scouring the forest for fire wood. Instead of trying to find my own wood, build my own fire, be anti-social, and clean it all up, I decided to walk to the neighboring camp site and offer to help break up some wood in exchange for letting me hang out with them by their fire. The guys ended up being some students from LA-Tech and were very nice. They had camped the night before and were getting ready for another long night of roughing it and keeping warm by their huge fire. Most of the guys were aviation students and one was an ME. They even treated me to some homemade, campfire jambalaya. After several hours by the campfire hydrating and fueling up, I headed in for the night. The weather was perfect to snuggle down in my sleeping bag and be perfectly comfortable. I fell asleep pretty quickly watching the moon slowly move over the sky through the trees above my tent. It was a pretty amazing scene.

Right on cue, I started waking up around 6:30, about 25 mins before my alarm was set for. Race prep was going according to plan and I was the first one to set up in transition. Score! Love getting the first spot, but it usually doesn't happen. Sleeping right by the race site and transition helps though. I was set and ready to race my race. I had done everything I could to prepare and all things seemed in order. Then, just like in 2005, the gun went off and we sprinted from the flags on the beach to the lake and began our .5 mile swim. Race morning goes by too quickly to really get nervous. I remember that from 2005. It happens so fast.

I came out of the water shoulder to shoulder with Kyle, he had won the Epic race the day before in a blazing 4:08. I knew he was going to be good. I got out of T1 first though because he had some trouble getting his bike shoes on. I was storming off on my Air 9 Carbon. I quickly passed some people that were on the course for the du and then got stuck behind some slower riders. This gave Kyle the chance to catch up to me. We passed this group and the race was on. I was riding his tail, too close. I didn't see the line as we went over some drops and roots and came unclipped and dropped my chain. He took off. I had to hammer to catch back up, but I was determined. As soon as I made his back wheel again, I made another mistake. I was focused on him instead of the trail and underestimated a descending curve in the trail. I went over the bars as I heard air hiss out of my front tire. I thought I was done. Thankfully, either the stan's sealed the hole or I just burped air out. Either way, after assessing things on the side of the trail, I decided the tire had enough air in it to finish the ride, maybe 15 pounds? I wasn't going to be able to push it any more. Now I was far behind. I figured he was going to be gone by now, but come mile 7 I could start catching glimpses of him through the trees. I was closing in. I finally caught him again at mile 9, at which point I nicked a tree with my bars and off again he went. My opinion of me being a good rider is starting to get questioned at this point. A few downhills and a huge water bar later and we were standing in T2 together. He headed out before I did and was gone! I looked back at transition as I was heading out and realized only our two bikes were in transition. We were leading the race neck and neck. Unfortunately, I just didn't have it on the run. The first mile was hard and it took me a bit to settle in. He established his lead in about that first mile and held it the rest of the race. I knew I was locked into position when I was running on the paved trail around the lake towards the finish line. I could see two guys a good way back that were going to be battling for 3rd, but my 2nd place was secure. All in all, it was a good race and a lot of fun. Props to Kyle Grieser for a great race, two days in a row. My hand is definitely hurting more today, but hopefully it will be better by this Sunday at Southeastern's. That course requires a serious grip on the bars to maintain control of the bike.

Stubborn Man Work

Well I finally finished it. Friday morning I went to Uhaul to pick up my hitch receiver for my new car. After four days of working on installing it, I have finally completed the mission. I knew I didn't need to pay them that $50 to install it in 30 minutes. I realized I had misjudged my car's situation when I found out I didn't have threaded holes in the frame and I would have to drill 1 inch access holes into the frame to get bolts and spacers inside of it. This was a very hard task. Drilling into the frame was hard work. My shoulder is still sore and aggravated from pushing on it. My eyes and face have endured many metal shavings. Digging them out of my eyes has become a common thing, even after the drilling stopped. During the drilling the metal was very hot and burned my arms several times. I had to cover my whole upper body in aprons to try to keep them off. It didn't always work. When I was done drilling and I had the bolts in place, I thought I was home free. Then, I realized that some metal was still in the way of putting the hitch up in its place. Luckily, the cable cutters I have snipped through this pretty easily. After bending this out of the way I figured it would go up in there smoothly. Wrong. When I took the nuts off the bolts to place the hitch onto them, two of them fell inside the frame as I only got one on. Failing to fish them out of the frame, I gave up and went over to the other side of the hitch to see what I could do there. I wrapped some rubber bands around the bolts after I took the nuts off in hopes that this would hold them in place while I placed the hitch over it. It worked. Awesome! Score one. Now back over to the other side. I had to dig around in the house to find a strong magnet to fish the bolts and spacers out of the frame so I could re-fish them through the frame with the metal spring. Re-doing work I thought I was already done with. I love doing that. I'm just glad I remembered to put on some locktite when I did the final threading of the nuts. A few twist of the socket wrench and I was done.

Now I have to find a bolt or locking hitch pin that will fit the 1 1/4" adapter that I have to run to accommodate my 2 inch bike rack. The receiver is nicely hidden under the car and would probably look really pro if I had a 1 1/4 inch bike carrier. Instead it has to stick out an additional 6 inches and I'm praying for clearance on elevation changes like driveways and dips in the road.

Since writing the first part of this post, I went and rode my bike, utilizing the new hitch. It works. Not going to lie, I was staring the bike and hitch down the whole time I drove to Shelby Farms. I was pretty paranoid about putting my brand new Air 9 Carbon mtb bike on the rack for its first test. The rack worked well and the ride was awesome. I love the new bike. It is incredible stiff and the 2x10 X.O group is rocking. Now that I have this task completed, I'm going to trek down to Birmingham tomorrow to do a very intense 2 day training camp. I'm hoping to get about 4 hours of training on Tuesday and at least 3 hours on Wednesday. I'll do all three sports both days and do the complete race course several times. Hopefully, this will really help me do better at the race in two weeks. Knowing the course will definitely help.

This is my digital footprint. This is me

So the races this past weekend got cancelled. I emailed the race director Tuesday after we were starting to get hit with all the storms and asked about the condition they were in there. I didn't hear back from him until Wednesday right before my karate final. The Xterra race was cancelled, but at the time he told me the road tri was still on. That gave me some solace. However, later that day when I got home and checked my email everything was cancelled. Me not having a race to do is small and petty to get worked up about when so many people lost there lives and homes both there in Arkadelphia and all around the South. Still, it sucks to work for many months training for the race and to get it taken away from me two days beforehand. It won't all go to waste. I have another race in two weeks and then Southeastern Championships the week after that. I wanted to get an idea of how my training had been going and see what other things I should practice and focus on before Southeastern's. That is judgement day. The day I am determined to bring home the jersey.

However, the rains haven't stopped. We are still getting hit with storms and the river is continuing to rise. The Mississippi is set to crest in the next few days within a foot of its record high and maybe even more with the continual rains. The Memphis in May BBQ festival has been moved. Something that has never happened before. I have never seen the Wolf River flood like it did. The trail system that I ride most often was under multiple feet of water and one section of it is bound to be washed away for good. These trails will probably not be rideable until June; that's if the storms stop any time soon...and the Wolf River doesn't start flowing backwards as the Mississippi crests. Last week, the United States (the South) saw more tornadoes in a single day than it has ever seen, 312 in a 24 hour period. That beats the old record by over 160 tornadoes! It also killed over 340 people, another record. The tornadoes devastated 6 Southern states, hitting Alabama the hardest.

The world is getting scary. All these terrible things happening and finishing school has made me think more deeply about my life and what purpose I am living for, who I am sharing my life with that makes it worthwhile. The world definitely could come to an end in my life and it makes me think about what I am really focusing on. If that is the case, then my bikes worth several, several thousands of dollars won't matter at all. (I just got a $5,800 bike and I don't know when I will ever be able to ride it. The rains have destroyed the trails.) Neither will any race victories, the car I just bought myself, graduation diplomas, or future careers. What am I working towards; what goals; what is motivating me? The only thing that will matter is right now. Will I have any regrets? Will I look back and wish I had done it differently. I have regrets in my life right now. Several. The only way not to, is to not ever look back. I don't think I could ever fully commit to doing that. I just have to take it one day at a time I guess and keep pushing on. Hopefully the rain will stop soon and things will begin to dry out. Hopefully the overseas situation will improve now that Osama is dead. Hopefully my Dad will stay safe and finish his contracts in Kuwait, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Iraq and get to return to a Memphis that he still recognizes.

Anyway, congrats to the Grizzlies for not only winning their first playoff game in franchise history, but winning the whole series! And winning game one of the second series. Another hats off to the Predators who are still playing for the Stanley Cup. I'll be watching both of those games tomorrow night. The greatest congrats and thanks goes out to the CIA operatives and Navy SEALS that have done years of work that ended with Osama Bin Laden being killed last night (may you be tormented in Hell). It's been a long 9 years, 7 months, but Justice has finally been served. The world is now a better place without him. Thanks to all those people that will never make the news and will never get any recognition for what they did in this special ops mission. Damn good speech by Obama too. Nicely done.