Eat. Tri. Venture.

Tuesday?  Yes, Tuesday.  With leaving on a Sunday, our days have been all screwed up.  We had breakfast of coffee and housemade granola at the Aspen Coffee Club in Fruita before coming back to the cottage and saddling up for the day.  We had decided the night before to check out the Kokopelli trails outside of Loma.  Those are classic Fruita trails, a little more technical than what we were on the day before but from everything we had read, a ton of fun.  Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating.  Radar showed rain all over that area.  So we decided on our second choice, the Western Rim trail, which according to the local “ride guide” was listed as being in the Palisade area.  Palisade is east of Grand Junction and well out of the way of where it appeared the rain was going.  Well, after getting on I-70 for a few miles in an easterly direction, JMac realized that Western Rim is not, in fact, near Palisade but back near our original destination and in the rain.  Why it was listed in the Palisade area of the ride guide we’ll never know.  So I turned around and headed west.  Maybe it would be like yesterday and the rain would just circle around us.

We got off the highway at the exit for the Western Rim trail.  Rain.  Cold rain.  Bleh.  We pulled into a parking lot, shortly after a brief adventure where JMac decided to try driving down a dirt road clearly labelled as requiring a “high clearance vehicle.”  Yes, it’s a rental, Dear, but we still have to pay for it if we bring it back without all of its pieces attached.  <Sigh.>  After quietly listening to the sound of our prepaid MTB rental go down the drain, we decided to head back towards Fruita, return the bikes and get a jump on our day in Moab.  It didn’t appear to be raining there.  But lo and behold, once we were on the highway, the sky cleared up some.  We had to drive right past the exit for the Kokopelli trail so we jumped off to check it out.  Cloudy, dark in the distance but no rain.  More importantly, the trails appeared to be dry.  Dire signs put up by the local trail community warned us to not ride on wet trails.

We unpacked the bikes and headed up Rustlers Loop.  After a shortish rocky climb which had me maxed out on my 1x, we arrived at the top of a plateau and the start of a very fun loop of riding. 

More rocky than the trails the day before, it was a mix of slick rock, gravel, sand and hard-packed dirt.  There were enough bench steps and drop offs to keep it interesting but nothing too scary.  The scenery was everything you could imagine with the Colorado River in one direction, the red walls of Colorado Monument behind it, open sky in another and curving sandstone (?, I’m not a geologist, people!) walls in another. 

It was nice being able to test the Juliana on some more technical terrain.  I was definitely able to get over some ledges that I wouldn’t normally do at home.  Was it the bike or just that I had more confidence on this bike?  I don’t know but it definitely has me continuing to ponder an upgrade.  I also was able to test the dropper post.  I don’t know how useful it would be for Ohio cross country riding but I could appreciate it for some more serious sketchy downhill riding.  JMac seemed to enjoy the Mach 6, even inquiring at Over the Edge for it’s now retail price.  They apply the cost of your rental plus depreciation for previous demo’s if you want to buy the bike you rode.  Unfortunately, if JMac bought a new bike that would immediately take his riding up a notch, which would then necessitate me definitely needing a new bike to try to get my game back up.  Since we haven’t won the lottery recently, I don’t see two new bikes in our futures.  #buzzkill

We made a brief stop at Gears in Fruita for a green smoothie, very tasty, and jumped on I-70, destination Moab!

Well, with about fifteen hours of sleep under my belt, Monday morning dawned quite early.  I picked up coffee for two at the local coffee shop...I love being in a destination where you can walk everywhere...and patiently waited (not) for JMac to rouse.  After breakfast at the local diner (Camilla's Café), we moseyed over to Over the Edge Sports to pick up our bike rentals.  We had looked into shipping our bikes but with most likely only having three days to ride (we also had hiking and backpacking on the agenda), it seemed like it would just be easier and cheaper to rent.  And so we did.  Jmac got a Pivot Mach 6 and I, a Juliana Furtado.  Both have 27.5" wheels, which we wanted to check out since we're still rocking it old school with 26" wheels at home.  I also wanted to check out a 1x set up, which may not have been the smartest decision out here when I would be at elevation, in the mountains, which my Ohio legs and lungs were most definitely not used to.  Bikes sized and ready to go, we rode back to the AirBnB and loaded up for the day.

Ride #1 was on the 18 Road Trails, just a short drive north of Fruita.  We could have actually ridden to the trails as the roads out there are pretty quiet.  Immediately in the parking lot we noticed that we did not get the memo that the in fashion for Fruita riding appears to be baggies and not our spandex kits.  If our sparkling rental bikes didn't give us away as out of towners, our apparel certainly did.  Oh well. 

<So you like how I threw in that second major in French that I haven't used in like, fifteen years plus?  Right.  #moneywellspent #lifedecisions.>  Anyways.  Sunday started way too early with a 6:30 a.m. flight from CLE to Denver. 

Go west, young man.  And so we did.  Almost immediately after navigating our way out of downtown Denver, I fell asleep.  No, Silly, JMac was driving.  I awoke to the crazy loud sound of sleet, ice and rain crashing down on our SUV and hitting the side walls as cars drove past.  Apparently we were going over Loveland Pass (almost 12k' elevation) just in time for a storm.  I closed my eyes and fell back asleep.  When I next awoke we were a good ways past there in central CO.  Gone were the green Rockies.  Instead, we were in much more arid country with mesas and scrub vegetation.  Still, very pretty.  We made it to Fruita is just about exactly four hours and checked in to our AirBnB rental.  It's a small cottage on the property of a main house just a half block from "downtown" Fruita.  We'll call it "charming."  Our two night stay cost about half of what our two day MTB bike rental cost.  #priorities #score  We dropped our shizzle off and walked into town.

I didn't think downtown Fruita would be big but I do think I thought it would have a wee bit more.  After all, Fruita is a world class mountain biking destination.  But I guess it does have everything you would need in that department--at least two bike shops that I saw, two breweries and the local pizza joint.  Mountain bikers' desires fulfilled?  Check.  We stopped in at Copper Club Brewing Company first and enjoyed a fine beverage on the patio...it was now a perfect 70 degrees out...and the company of a couple of Grand Junction guys who were out on the local trails that day.  We all got a good laugh out of our non-elevation ready lungs that would be stretched in the next week.  We then made our way to Suds Bros Brewery on the other side of the block for dinner.  Dinner and beers out of the way, JMac reviewed our trail destination for Monday and I...wait for it...fell back asleep.  I don't cross time zones well.  But with a game plan in hand we were ready for ride #1 come Monday.

Where in the hell am I going to put all this sh*t?  In asking this question as I stared at the space I had selected for myself in transition, I had inadvertently answered one of life’s deepest questions: What sport could possibly be more complicated that the complicated sport of triathlon?  The answer:  Offroad triathlon.

The Xterra World Tour is a series of trail running races and offroad triathlons held at various venues around the world.  In the triathlon series, professional athletes compete for a prize purse while amateurs race for national titles and spots in the World Championship via a points system.  In an Xterra (offroad) triathlon, competitors swim, mountain bike and trail run as opposed to the traditional bike and run on the road.  Last year I started taking mountain biking a little more seriously and began racing in the Ohio Mountain Bike Championship Series.  This year I decided to take it a step further and combine mountain biking and triathlon to see what would happen.  Xterra at East Fork was my first step into this realm.

The Xterra World Tour makes its stop in Ohio at Xterra at East Fork.  East Fork is an Ohio State Park just outside of Cincinnati.  The race was on Saturday, June 21st and consisted of a 1000 meter swim in the park lake, 12 mile mountain bike ride and 6.5 mile trail run.  To the best of my knowledge, there is no set distance in Xterra triathlons although they can be roughly condensed into three distances, America Tour Races (East Fork), EPIC races (long distance) and sprints/super sprints.  The sprints and super sprints do not count towards the points series.  Since I had never been to East Fork and knowing the course is a huge part of mountain biking, JMac and I drove with our number one dog, Holly, down to Cinci on Friday in order to stop at the park and pre-ride the mountain bike course.  On the course maps we had printed out, the course seemed to be a pretty straightforward loop of the “marked” mountain bike trails.  The problem was that the mountain bike trail seemed to intersect with itself and other hiking trails.  We made slow progress finding our way around.  I’m pretty sure there is a color coding scheme to the madness but we did not have that information at the time.  What we did get was a basic feel for the trails.  In doing my own research via Quickdirt (http://quickdirt.com/2014/02/01/2014-ombc-races-top-5-lists-race-summaries/ ), my go to source these days for the nitty gritty in Ohio mountain biking, I learned that the East Fork trails were fast, flowy and less technical by Ohio mountain bike standards.  My only caveat to this would be that if the trails are wet, they become more technical as there are many roots and turns which can become slick.  I know this because about forty minutes into my pre-ride it started to downpour.  While I escaped without incident on Friday, I would not be so lucky on Saturday.  I cut the pre-ride short and we packed up to check into our hotel. 

For dinner I had located a small local brewery called Fifty West not too far from where we were staying (and oddly enough near Route 50W).  They had a nice selection of small, medium and large plates for dinner and a nice range of beers from which to sample. 

Saturday morning dawned overcast and humid—like chew the air humid.  Ich.  I had the standard hotel continental breakfast (oats with raisins and almonds and coffee).  We checked out, took the H Dog for a walk and drove to East Fork.  This race had a late start compared to most triathlons—9:00 a.m.  In an effort to be more spouse-friendly I did not insist that we get there as soon as transition opened.  Instead, we arrived at the late hour of 7:00 a.m.  Well, offroad triathletes must take after their mountain bike cousins because I was still the fourth or fifth athlete to arrive and get into transition.  I checked in, picked up my tech tee and a smattering of sample schwag.  Note, I was asked to produce my USAT card, which although I think that’s the rule for USAT races, I don’t know that I have ever been asked before at a “local” race. 

I surveyed the transition setups around me and tried to take my traditional setup with my tri bike and adopt it to my circumstances for the day.  This is what I figured out:  

JMack had left to go for a ride of the mountain bike course himself so once transition was set up, I did a warm up run, including my new favorite dynamic warm up.   http://triathlon.competitor.com/2013/08/training/your-best-10-minute-run-warmup-2_46795   This warm up seems to help the tightening in my hips quite a bit.  I then went to hang with the Holly Dog until JMac returned.  I meant to eat a banana during this time but wasn’t up for it.  I think the humidity was staving off any urge to eat.  JMac returned with a course description:  wet, slick, two smaller loops instead of one large, well-marked and eat on the road section between the loops.  Got it.  We headed down to the beach for the start.  It was a small crowd.  In the end I think there were about forty-five participants in the offroad tri with an additional eight or so in the kayak division (paddle a kayak instead of swim).  These numbers were down about twenty from the previous year.  I think the wet conditions scared some folks off.  The water was calm and pretty warm but I decided to go with the sleeveless wetsuit.  I hadn’t been in open water all season and in the event of a mid-swim panic, wanted the buoyancy of the suit.  I warmed up in the water while they sent the kayaks off.  Then, it was a mass, in water start.  The horn sounded and we were off.  

I stayed to the outside but quickly found my groove.  The water temp was perfect.  It was a simple out and back course (19:19 including the run to transition, 17^th).  This was the best open water swim I have had in a while and I ran into transition feeling pretty good.  I navigated transition fairly effectively and hopped on the mountain bike (1:22, 9^th).  The ride began with a sustained climb on the park road to get to the trails.  I tried to spin it out in an easier gear as to not use up those matches in the first half mile of the ride.  I headed into the woods on the tail of a couple of guys.  As mentioned earlier, the trails really are very flowy and generally non-technical in the scheme of things.  But due to the rain the previous day and overnight, they were very wet and very slick.  I tried to be assertive, sticking with the guy in front of me but unable to decide if I should take the pass.  Unfortunately, in my hesitation to pass I allowed another female to catch me and pass both of us.  I subsequently passed the guy too and found myself in kind of a no-man’s land with not a lot of other racers around me.  I hopped off my bike for a couple of log and sketchy-looking , rocky stream crossings but managed to ride everything else.  Unfortunately, I realized pretty quickly I had not set up something correctly on my watch and I was not getting any heart rate data.  I rely on this quite a bit but had no choice to just try to go with how I was feeling.  I popped out onto the park road and took in some fuel before my second lap.  Since it was hot and humid I opted for a few salted dates, which tasted awesome—sweet and salty at the same time, and some margarita Clif shot blocks.  I was also drinking constantly from my Camelbak.  After my nutrition meltdown in the heat last summer at Musselman I have tried to be super conscious of drinking and getting my electrolytes. 

Apparently, I was the only competitor interested in refueling on the road section because as I slowed down, I was passed by a couple of male riders.  (Note to self:  Need to learn to eat faster on mountain bike).  As I entered the trails for the second loop I was hopeful that the trails had dried out some as it had warmed up considerably in the last hour.  The trails near the lake edge which could catch a breeze had dried out but the ones lower, and completely covered by foliage seemed to be in worse shape.  In a momentary lapse of judgment my handlebar caught a piece of hanging vine, turned sharply and flipped me off on to my left side.  I jumped up, flipped the bars back around, refused a polite offer of assistance from a passing competitor and jumped back on my bike.  Whew.  Nothing appeared to be broken, bike or otherwise.  A little while later, while making a sharp turn I misjudged again, braked when I should not have on a slick hump of mud and went over again on to my left side.  Seriously?  Ugh.  This one hurt.  While I was muddy, it did not look like there was an excessive amount of blood so I flipped my bike over, hopped on and raced toward the end of the course.  At some point during this time I had bumped my watch and stopped the clock entirely so I had no real idea where I was or how much longer I had to go.  It turned out to not be that far.  I popped back out on the road and headed for transition (1:41:13, 31^st). 

Transition was fairly uneventful even though it seemed to take an excessive amount of time to tie my shoelaces and take my biking gloves off (1:08, 13^th).  I grabbed my new handheld water bottle and trotted back up the hill before turning into the woods.  Two items of note here:  First, I opted for the handheld water bottle after listening to Zen Tri’s Ironman Texas report http://www.zentriathlon.com/home/2014/5/18/podcast-ironman-texas-2014.html .  Brett suggested carrying a water bottle on the run just to splash yourself off in the heat between aid stations.  While this (obviously) was not an Ironman, I thought the idea was a good one as it was hot, humid and there were only two water stops on the course.  Given this was a trail run I thought I might be out there longer than normal.  Second, despite my time, I really enjoyed this run.  It was a true offroad course.  I felt like I was running through the Amazon.  The trail was mostly narrow singletrack.  It was rooty, up and down and included log-overs, stream crossings and even some short, steep sections where I could almost put my hands down to help myself up.  There was also a section of very muddy, horsepoopy horse trail and another section of paved multipurpose trail.  But the majority was singletrack.  I had not done a lot of singletrack running in my training so I was worried how my ankles and knees would hold up but they seemed to do fine.  I tried to maintain what felt like a consistent pace and get through.  Looking back, I probably could have gone harder but in the heat, I think I felt more maxed out than I was.  Also, the course was a lollipop with only a little bit of lollipop stick at the end.  So I held back a little bit on the loop section not knowing what would be coming next (1:14:17, 32^nd).  JMac and the H Dog were waiting for me at the aid stations, giving me a nice boost.  

The final section was a reverse of the original climb so it was downhill to the finish.  In the end, I finished 2^nd AG, 5^th female and 27^th overall (3:17:21).  I had been hoping for a time closer to three hours but every race is a learning experience.  Also, this race served as a reconnaissance mission for the OMBC race to be held at East Fork later in the season.  So, I’ll be back.

So the last couple of weeks have really been a great blend for all three.  Let’s start with the tri part.  This week’s recovery wraps up my second block of interval-focused training.  I’ve been working on run drill intervals at 5k pace, painful, long, broken sets of 2000 in the pool, also painful, and a mountain bike race, time trial test and more intervals on the bike.  The time trial test was a bit of a fail as I was just absolutely burned out from the race and intervals I had done a few days earlier.  But in addition to the threshold work, I completed a nice, long run, where I felt strong, even though I have not been running as many miles recently, and several long mountain bike rides.  It’s nice that summer finally appears to be here and the trails are drying out.  That being said, I’m enjoying every minute of my recovery week. 

Eat.  I have managed to stay on track for the most part, even while traveling last weekend to Asheville, NC.  Asheville is well-known for its progressive, local food scene and I was not disappointed.  Our local tour guides took us to several restaurants which catered to all dietary considerations including vegetarian, dairy and gluten free.  Besides enjoying some great local grub, I got ideas for some new recipes to try at home. 

Venture.  JMac and I ventured to several new areas over the weekend.  First, we checked out the mountain bike trails at Mountwood Park in West Virginia on our drive down to North Carolina.  http://www.mountwoodpark.org/Biking_trails.html   While we only had a chance to ride a small part of the thirty mile system, the trails were in good shape, well-marked and fun.  The park itself was very nice as well.  After riding, we enjoyed a picnic lunch there before getting back on the road.  Being only ten minutes off of interstate 77, we definitely plan on going back there again either as a getaway weekend or on our next trip down south.  We next ventured to more new and not so new trails at Bent Creek in Asheville.  http://www.mtbikewnc.com/trailheads/pisgah-national-forest/pisgah-ranger-district/bent-creek/   I had ridden there several years ago on my last visit to the area.  My recollection of my introductory ride there was long, painful, uphill gravel grinding followed by long, sometimes scary downhills.  It’s amazing what a couple of additional years on the mountain bike will do.  Nothing could be farther from the truth than my memory of yore.  While you do utilize a gravel park road to connect the various trails, the climbing was a lot less painful than I remembered.  And the downhills?  So fun.  So. Much. Fun.  There were wide, sweeping, banked turns, allyoops, and on the trails we rode, very few obstacles to navigate.  The trails at Bent Creek were a blast.  I am so very jealous of the folks in Asheville who have access to such a great system right outside their door. 

I would imagine that, at some point, I will have enough mountain biking experience where the first few miles of the first trail ride of the season don’t leave me twitching with nervousness.  That point is getting closer but has not yet arrived. 

Last Sunday, JMac and I packed up the gear and drove down to Mohican for our first mountain bike ride of the season.  It was also my first ride of the entire twenty-four mile loop as earlier attempts were cut short by time constraints.  The weather could not have cooperated more perfectly.  It had been dry for a couple of days and Sunday brought clear, blue skies with temperatures in the 70’s.  There were no tough clothing decisions that morning such as hat or no hat, pants or leg warmers or exactly how many layers do I want to wear on top.  It was shorts and short-sleeve jerseys the whole way, baby.

But as we started out, turning over the cranks those first few miles, it was back to mountain biking 101.  And so I kept replaying all of the lessons I have learned over the last few years in my head.

1.       Look twenty feet ahead, not at the ground immediately in front of you.  This is probably the most helpful piece of advice I have been given for riding.  Being in a position to anticipate the terrain allows you to go faster and avoid nasty surprises.

2.      Trust your bike.  After being on skinny wheels for so long, I initially feel a little uncertain hitting some loose rock, off camber roots or wet spots.  But then I remember, oh yeah, I’m on a mountain bike with big fat tires and full suspension.  I can roll over that.

3.      Speed is your friend.  Oh.  I am so bad at this one.  Use your momentum to gain traction over obstacles. 

4.      No overgripping.  It’s wasted energy and makes your whole upper body hurt.

5.      Don’t be afraid to get dirty.  It’s just fun.

6.      Concentrate.  No multi-tasking.  One of the cool things I like about mountain biking is one of my favorite things about climbing—it demands all of my attention.  There is no thinking about that problem at work, what we’re having for dinner, a cure for cancer, nothing.  Last summer I rode off a bridge wide enough to accommodate a Smart Car into a dry, rock-filled creekbed while contemplating what I needed to accomplish during the upcoming week.  Don’t do that.  It hurts and passersby look at you like the gumby you are.

7.      But relax.  You’re riding your bike, for heaven’s sake!  Last weekend, after somehow not crashing through a series of sharp, loose, downhill turns, I finally popped off at a rock garden.  Before jumping back on my bike, I took an extra second to take just a deep breath and regroup mentally.  That’s all I needed to steady my nerves.

8.      Yell Woo!  Woo! on all of the alley oops.  Because alley oops are so much fun.  And isn’t fun what this is all about anyways? 

Have a very fun week.  And don’t forget about that nutrition—eat real food so you can live longer, better and have even more fun.