IMBCS #2 Ingawanis

We had a nice full day today, about 350 miles of driving with a race in the middle. This was IMBCS #2 at Camp Ingawanis near Waverly IA. With all the rain and snow over the past week, it would seem that course conditions would be questionable and we'd been getting email updates from the director that parts of the course would be removed and re-routed as required with total length determined day-of. During the drive, we passed many crop fields with either a remaining coating of snow or standing water which couldn't drain away.

Once we arrived, the venue area seemed to have drained out pretty well as it's located at relatively high elevation. This was a low-key event run by extremely nice people. No USA-Cycling officials, just a verbal count-down and "GO". 

I did a crappy, crappy job on the start-gate sprint and wound up working around several people over the first 1/4 of the lap. Due to course modifications implemented to accommodate the weather, we were only doing like 5.25 miles and only a single lap at that. Finish times were around 30-minutes so it was a short one. I finished 5th in my category and Corrine finished 2nd in hers, putting her on the podium! Cody's rear derailleur folded into his wheel spokes and was completely destroyed about 10 minutes after the start. On the bright-side, there are still series points for DNF? Bummer because Cody had already gapped the entire field and had only one straggler holding on. That almost certainly would have been a first place finish. Next time.

I don't really have any trail pictures, only the open grassy area used for start/finish. It was pretty fun with a bunch of flowy singletrack. There was also an unintended mud pit at the end for flavor. 

The race director and team had provided a big crockpot of pasta as well as cookies etc. and I saw the below object off to the side. This is a boy-scout camp (all race proceeds went to the scouts) and I think this was some sort of food which was left in a fridge last summer and was just discovered today? As mold goes, there's a pretty impressive color pallet. It's also pretty good at growing up and out of the pan. 

I think these podium logs were broken - Corrine is second place but still way taller than first. Maybe it's just the photo angle?

Up Next: IMBCS #3 Seven-Oaks Rec!

Frigid Flowers

Wow, accurate weather forecasting, who knew. I was pretty sure this "snow" would be just a dusting that imitated a heavy frost. Measurable snow falling at this time is pretty historical and has only happened a few times in the last hundred years. Last year on this day, it was almost 90°F!

It started innocently enough in the evening.  

We went for a walk to pick up some pizza and it was definitely going to be a little hard on Tulip Time at this point, it was still just menacing flurries. 

The next morning, it was clear the snow meant business.

I did fund the plowing of 1/4" snow depth somewhat comical.

After the storm was over, we had a forecast for pretty quick return to seasonal normal temps.

Once the heat turned back on, people came outside again. The food booths were bustling along.

Tubs for the street scrubbers had ice/slush on them.

Many of the West-Market Park vendors had a rough go of the weekend. Lots of collapsed tents with the fabric removed and frame haphazardly discarded. 

I think a person could have collected these and made a few good ones from the parts. They were all over the place. 

The snow melted off pretty quick and the city did manage to run a single day and night parade on Saturday. 

Spring!

Hard to believe we've got snow in the forecast for this week. Most certainly a great day to soak it in while we can. The amount of growth around the yard seems to have almost doubled in 24hrs!

Elkhart Time-Trial #1

Corrine and Cody registered for the whole Elkhart Time Trial Series this year. I'd never actually been to a time trial before so, other than a basic understanding of how it worked, I wasn't sure what this really looked like. It would stand to reason that a person could get desensitized to seeing blingy hardware rolling around all over the place but this time trial crew takes it to a whole other level. It's amazing the things that are done to save a couple tenths of a second on 20 minutes. For example, a skin-suit in itself is not fast enough but it also should have a golf-ball-like texture on the surface of the fabric. 

It was a pretty good time. After wondering if we'd ever see 60° again, it was a great thing to stand outside and see blue sky without needing gloves and a hat. There was a decent little breeze blowing which appears to increase everyone's times. This is an out-and-back course which is about 3.5mi each direction. You can't go fast enough with the wind behind you (return leg) to make up for how much the wind slowed you down in the first half. People were coming back through the finish over 30mph though. I did see one guy with a cape on his back that was supposed to turn into a sail when the wind was behind him. I do not know how that worked out (illegal I would think?).

Apologies to the guy on the far right below - I did pin your number plate on with a large wrinkle in the center and it may have slowed you down. While I do have more than one season of experience pinning plates onto other people at the last minute before races (thanks tobacco chewing guy at Night-Cap), I'd still consider myself an amateur. 

After getting the lay of the land, we unloaded and setup. We brought a trainer to warm up on (so pro right?). 

That's pretty much where the start is located. The road was not closed to car traffic and the race used both lanes.

This series appears to have a really big turnout!

Cody won the door-price raffle which was a fairly $$ aero TT helmet. You can tell he's excited to go.

Corrine out of the "gate".

Next stop: Camp Ingwanis IMBCS #2, a little over a week away!

Racked and dry hopped.

=

Sylvan Island Stampede, season opener

Race report: Sylvan Island Stampede. This is also known as IMBCS #1 for those doing the Iowa MTB series. I had been looking forward to getting the MTB season started for a while, especially since we get to do so riding for Jimmy Johns. Weather forecasting looked for rain but warm temps so it would be fun either way. I switched to water-proof chain lube just in case (thanks speedo-wearing Pro-Gold guy at Jingle-Cross!).

We stayed overnight at Joe's place in Davenport after an uneventful trip and got up bright and early(ish) to prepare the next morning. After leaving with roughly the exact amount of time required to get to the race remaining, I discovered that it's no problem to drive 55 in the 30 zones around the quad-cities - handy! What was truly a surprise was the train which we had to wait on while we could see the parking-lot for the venue. As the train slowed and then stopped, a plan was formed that we'd simply park on the side of the road and jump over the train car hitches with our bikes and ride the rest of the way. After driving a little further down the road, the end of the train appeared and we were able to drive around! I do regret that I did not take a picture of the guy who got out of his vehicle to yell and shake his fists at the train.

Arriving at the registration table with ten minutes (per the dj/announcer) until race-go, Cody got his number plate and was all set. Corrine and I were left to stand there and wait (on what I'm not sure) when someone in the registration tent answered a cell-phone call and promptly told the other volunteers that the race was closed to new entries. We were told that so long as we pre-registered (we had), we were still o.k. but between the time we handed our waivers back and receiving our number plates, the race was totally closed. Not racing in the correct category meant that any points earned that day were basically forfeit. We could choose to race Category-2 or a special Maverick class. Category-2 started too late and wouldn't work, so we did Maverick instead. This was a longer course as well as requiring one extra lap to be completed. It also counted for nothing series-wise and isn't even listed on USA-Cycling.

Shortly before Maverick race time, we were milling around and noticed a small line of people removing bar-end / integrated grips from their bikes and discussing where to get new clamps. Joe had also noticed an official going around telling people they had to come off. This was not good - both Corrine and I run Ergons with the shortest bar-end. I plan on resisting at first but then realize that an official is pulling people off the start line as well so it's inevitable. Thankfully there was a bike shop running a repair/support tent. They sold us new grips and even gave us a discount because we didn't have any more money to cover the asking price.  The news later was that this is the first year that USA-Cycling ran a combined rulebook for both road and mountain-bike. A rule about no bar-ends for road cycling (and cyclocross) was then enforced against mountain biking. It apparently caused quite a stir, as it got a regional coordinator and technical director involved and suddenly fixed now.

Shiny new grips and number plate installed, we lined up near the front. This worked out about perfect for me as I finished only a couple places from where I started. It's such a huge waste of time and energy working your way through a crowd. It was a really cool course because it's different from most things I've ridden. I certainly wouldn't want to ride on broken concrete/bricks/re-bar all the time but it's fun to do something new. This island used to be home to a factory which has since become decayed and shrouded by replacement plant life.

Finishing 12 out of 39 in a harder category than planned, I felt pretty good about my fitness given that we've only been hitting it hard since Jan-1 (4-5hrs on trainers and 2-3hrs outside each week ever since). Most definitely it's going to get way better throughout the summer. I had a mini battle with another guy for the entire final lap and we did a big sprint to the finish. We tied (stats do not go past .01 resolution) for fastest finish sprint in the whole category. There was a timing gate a couple hundred yards from the actual finish gate so they were measuring that section. I had a new peak heart-rate of 207 and averaged 180 over the entire 70 minutes. I certainly would have burned completely out trying that last year!

I have no pictures of my own really so I'm using the ones provided by Hanson Photo, which look great.


Most photographs courtesy of Hanson Photo Design - thanks!

Minor component carnage - I'd completely forgotten about a cracked pedal body on my mountain-bike. I discovered it over a year ago when using the grease-gun on them. Grease started coming out of the crack instead of the shaft seal! Long story short, it almost became a major issue. I found it as below when unloading at home after the race. Good thing it survived until the finish. Due to the pedal construction, it won't completely fall apart even if that cleat boss tears off, but it would kinda suck to only have one side functioning the whole time.

The stainless-steel ring was just flopping around and you could almost pull it off. 

Strip and clean.

I got a new body kit, loaded them with grease and reassembled. Good as new!

Spring showers?

Big weekend-type training day today and we had a little precipitation. We've been riding outside all winter so we've got it pretty well figured out but the feet still tend to freeze by the time we're done with a 2hr ride. Some shoe-covers for next year I think. I brought the Go-Pro along which worked o.k. except the snow was wet and stuck to the lens pretty good, might try some wax on it next time so at least the water will bead up instead of streak.