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Sunday, May 30, 2010

Bikeleague.org Blog » How Does Your State Rank in Bicycle Friendliness?

I am impressed that Wisconsin and Minnesota came in at 2nd and 4th respectively. We do have some great roads!

"The BFS rankings are based on a 95-item questionnaire that evaluates a state’s commitment to bicycling and covers six key areas: legislation, policies and programs, infrastructure, education and encouragement, evaluation and planning, and enforcement."

Bikeleague.org Blog » Blog Archive » How Does Your State Rank in Bicycle Friendliness?

NCC-HAC Gravel Metric Invitational

Although this ride takes place tomorrow and it's too late to be of any benefit, I still wanted to share this video. I think it's awesome!

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Blue Hills Felsenmeer State Natural Area - Part 1

I have been meaning to put together a decent post about this but I was hoping to take another hike out there, as well as do some more reading prior to writing up the full report. I will try to squeeze it in this weekend. In part 2 I will include more pictures and details of where it is located, how to find it, and some geological info with links to research projects on the area. For now, here are a few pictures from when I visited the area this spring. Although they've been doctored up quite a bit, I will say that so far I'm impressed with my phone's camera!


It was an 80 degree day on April 1st. We had an interesting spell of warm weather throughout the month of March, nearly reaching record high temps on several days. I hadn't seen snow on the ground elsewhere for over 3 weeks, but the bottom of the valley was a nice and cool temp - some snow still remained in the bottom.


Above is a view from the west end of the valley - I'm sitting on the ridge seen in the photo below. I would guess that the rocks on the south side and center aren't exposed to sun until mid-April or May - possibly later. They were noticeably cooler than the rocks on the north side. Also notice the abundance of lichens growing on the southern rocks - to me this indicates that they probably maintain a fairly constant cool temperature throughout the summer.


Stay tuned for more info in Part 2. Cheers!

Thursday, May 27, 2010

Almanzo 100 - May 15, 2010

As usual, I have some serious catching up to do on this blog...still working on that whole procrastination thing. ;) I'll do my best to give a recap of the Almanzo. First off, here's a GMAP of the course: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3758875. I believe it was roughly 6500 ft of climbing.

I was extremely pumped about this race for a number of reasons. First, most of my older siblings grew up in the Rochester area. As a bike racer, my oldest brother Bryan had covered quite of bit of ground in southern Minnesota doing races of his own. From what I can remember, my brother Derek also had done some racing around the Rochester area, completing a century at a pretty young age. Although this year's race was moved from Rochester to Spring Valley, I was still excited to do some serious riding/racing near the old stomping grounds. Secondly, this was the first race I'd be participating in since the dreaded Tuscobia...where I failed miserably due to poor trail conditions and a lack of the proper snow bike to get the job done. Thirdly, since January I have been riding like hell, spending a good 10-15 hours per week in the saddle. By race day I had completed several 100 mile rides, with a bulk of the miles consisting of the loose Blue Hills gravel. I also spent the 2 weeks prior to the race chomping plenty of food, thoroughly hydrating, and properly tapering down on the riding time to build up the reserves needed to hammer the entire 100 miles of river valley gravel. I was ready!

Race day rolls around, and it was pretty neat to see 400 plus bikers geared up ready to eat some gravel. Lining up early, and near the front of the pack, my plan was to hang behind the front group of 10-15 guys as long as I could.

As we roll out, I can already tell the pack is antsy to get movin'. The first 2 miles were pavement, then 3 miles of gravel, and already the pace is picking up to 30-35 mph on a long descent. Noticing a left turn coming up I make my way over to the left shoulder to avoid any stragglers swinging too far right - sending folks off the right hand side of the road. All within a flash, I see some commotion in the front right - certainly a crash - then the entire pack reacting to the initial crash swinging left hard and fast. I begin bumping shoulders with the guy to my right as the pack is pushing left. Soon enough, myself and about 6 or 7 other guys get shoved off in to the ditch at a good 30 mph. The ditch dropped down 3-4 feet below the road, and damn was it rocky! From this point on I honestly can only remember bits and pieces...

In a confused daze, I notice my head is now POUNDING, my knees and forearms are scraped and bleeding, my bike is lying roughly 10 ft away, my helmet visor had popped off, and most everything that was in my jersey pockets (snickers, clif bars, a water bottle) are scattered between me and my bike. Somehow my cell phone managed to not receive a single scrape. "Well", I guess I thought to myself, "does Derek's bike work?". I was riding my older brother's Gunnar Crosshairs for this event. Picking up the snickers etc. and stuffing them back in my jersey pocket I realize that my left shoulder stings a little, and it's difficult to reach my left jersey pocket. No bother...let's check out this bike. I pick it up and try to pedal it...but it's not moving...shit! Hmm...after a few seconds of blurred adrenaline filled examination I notice the quick release lever is loose and all I need to do is tighten it back up and realign the wheel. Awesome! Bike looks good! Back in business!

Not knowing where my riding buddy Brent is at this point - I hoped he wasn't involved in the crash, I hoped he had passed me - I'll try to catch him! A few miles down the road and sure enough, here's Brent on the shoulder tinkering with his chain tool...he busted his chain. "YO!", I yell. Puzzled why I was behind him, he looks at me and says "Daaaaayam, did you crash?". Uh oh, that doesn't sound good. I realize I look a little worse than I felt. He needed my multi-tool as his wasn't working too well...so I stopped, handed him my multi-tool and began to examine my wounds a little better. "Your nose is bleeding, dude". Damn, it was...but not too bad. My chin was also bleeding, and my sunglasses had some - not really scratches - deep gravel grooves throughout. I must have whacked my chin on the handlebars and done a nice face-plant in the dirt. "Umm, Brent, I'm pretty banged up aren't I? I might as well just finish this race with you...there's really no sense in me racing it at this point. We can cruise it."

After this, I really don't remember too much. I think something happened with Brent's chain again...so there was one stop. Later I get a flat tire...so there's another stop. It was a good thing Brent was there, because as the ride continued my shoulder was hurting more and more...enough to the point where I had a hard time pumping up my flat tire. I was told by Brent that I didn't stand up on a single hill for the rest of the day. Bummer, I had developed some decent climbing skills on these Blue Hills rollers...but it was hurting my shoulder too much to do any aggressive climbing. Well, sans crashing, mechanicals etc., I probably could have shaved a good hour and 30 min to 2 hours off my time...but that's OK. Needless to say, I still had an excellent time, and we finished!!!

My shoulder, and now one of my right ribs was hurting pretty bad by Monday, and I can clearly tell I won't be participating in the following weekend's Cheq 100...and in my opinion that's the saddest news of the whole story. =( After some consultation with the family doctor - well, my sister...who happens to be a doctor - it was advised that I head to the clinic for some x-rays. It turns out that adrenaline can do some wonderful things. The crash at mile 5 left me with a broken rib and possibly some torn tissue in my rotator cuff. It has now been over a week since the crash, and I'm gaining some movement back in my left arm/shoulder, but it still stings like hell. I'm crossing my fingers that in a week or two I have full movement back in my arm, and that my shoulder was simply badly bruised, in which case there will be no need for an MRI and/or surgery. The rib will heal in time.

It really was an awesome course and an awesome race! Thanks very much to Chris Skogen for planning/hosting, Craig Linder for these excellent photos, the town of Spring Valley for letting the racers use their facilities, and all of the volunteers who helped put together this awesome event, especially the nice lady who gave me those 2 Ibuprofen at the checkpoint. I will definitely be back next year!

With that said, I'm still super excited and anxious to get back on the bike. I'm about to drop some cash on a Salsa El Mariachi 29er that rolls pretty damn sweet, and I'm itchin' to get it up to the CAMBA trails...but I think I'll have to stick to some easy road and fixie rides for a few weeks. Just the other day, I heard a wise and seasoned racer say, "Don't be surprised if all this rest brings you back stronger and faster than before". I sure hope so!!!