Mellow Johnny's Classic 2012

The first test of the 2012 season - the Mellow Johnny's Classic down in Texas!  

The first big race of the season is always exiting, but this year, an Olympic year, made the vibe much more palpable.  All of North America’s big hitters in cross country mountain biking showed up in Texas for the first round of the Pro XCT.  It was great to reunite with so many members of the traveling MTB circus. 

Teammate Kris Sneddon and I were proudly representing for Kona amongst the 70+ elite racers who lined up on Saturday’s XC event – 5 laps on a frenetic, rocky course at the Flat Creek Ranch in Texas hill country.  I lined up front row and soaked in a bit of the moment before the gun went off…poised next to the best racers in North America…Adam Craig, Geoff Kabush, Todd Wells, Sam Schultz, Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski, Max Plaxton, Derek Zandstra, Jeremiah Bishop…all of us on a quest for the Summer Olympics in August.  Everyone had brought their A-Game.  This season would start faster and harder than any I had ever done.     

Enough thinking though!  

Down to business!   

BOOM 

And it did...!

(me far left) 

We blasted off down the dusty start-loop.  I was a bit wide on the start stretch and missed the wholeshot, but blitzed into a spot in the top-10 and stuck on the lead group into the first singletrack.  The engine felt powerful on all of the climbs, though I felt a bit inefficient carrying speed through the jagged rock sections, losing seconds here and there.  For the majority of the race I was in the mix with a small group riding for 7^th, with 5^th and 6^th bobbing and weaving through the brush not far ahead.  Going into the last lap, sitting 8^th behind JHK, Adam Craig (who had flatted on the first lap) surged through (with probably the ride of the day, having come from 37^th place!).  I stuck to his wheel on the climbs, which was motivating for me…until I heard a hiss coming from my back tire…and willed the Stans sealant to fill it up…still hissin…quick stop to put in some air before a hard-charging chase group caught me…and cranked into the finish in a respectable 9^th. 

By my historical standards, this the BEST start to any season I have had – I've never finished this high up in the first race of the season, not to mention placing this well against the top North American racers, all of whom are faster this year on account of their Olympic prep.  So, overall, I'm PUMPED!

By my upgraded standards, however, I was hoping for a bit better...a top 7, or at least the 3rd or 4^th American.  Still, I feel confident that my preparations have been excellent, and that I demonstrated my form by keeping in the mix for the entire (albeit SHORT) race.   

One more week of fine-tuning at home before leaving for the first World Cup in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. Stay tuned!  Thanks for reading.  

-spencer  

Old Pueblo!

I was called upon to travel back to sunny Arizona this last weekend to visit a nomadic outpost in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, an area known by the locals as "The Old Pueblo".

The nomads had assembled an impressively sized village of RV campers and tents...

When I arrived, I somehow angered all of the local villagers, who chased me down the road and into the hot, cactus-laden desert...

Terrified for my life, I jumped on my bike and sped away...

I rode swiftly...all day...

and all night...

and in the end made friends with several of the villagers, particularly this group of ruffians, members of the Kona Bike Team.

Congrats to Cory Wallace (far right) for winning the Solo Men's event (18 laps, or ~300 MILES in 24 hours).  Congrats to the Epic Endurance team from Boulder, CO for riding like machines and winning the 4-person team category.  Congrats to all who made it through the race!  And big thanks to the race organizers, volunteers, and to Kona Bicycles for putting together such an awesome weekend of good biking and good people.  

Stay tuned for the first stop of the US Pro XCT in Austin, TX, March 3rd-4th  

Thanks for reading...

Carbon Equivalence

In less than a month, I'm jumping on a plane to South Africa for the first round of the mountain bike World Cup!  Not only will this race kick off the international race season, it will also kick off the final Olympic Qualification period, which ends on May 22nd after World Cup #4 in La Bresse, France.  The qualification period consists of FOUR rounds of the World Cup:

1. Pietermaritzburg, South Africa - March 17th
2. Houffalize, Belgium - April 14th
3. Nove Mesto na Morave, Czech Republic - May 13th
4. La Bresse, France - May 20th

Speaking of race schedules, it's always fun to map out the season.  As the jet-propelled crow flies, here is (approximately) my itinerary for the season:


View 2012 Race Season in a larger map

Assuming there-and-back again travel, this track will cover at least 75,000 miles, or roughly three times around the globe.  While cycling is a staple environmentally sustainable transportation, it's ironic to consider how many resources are required to complete a high-end competitive cycling season.  With all of my globetrotting to these events, I'm making a hefty contribution to the transportation sector CO2 emissions:

   

By coincidence, I can theoretically feel better about [maybe] breaking even on my carbon emissions through the work I do with Ridgeline Energy developing large wind and solar projects.  So far, we have 200 megawatts of wind operating in Idaho.  Based on the EPA's carbon equivalence emissions factor of 6.8956 x 10^-4 metric tons CO₂ / kWh , that renewable energy should offset approximately 411 metric tons of CO2 equivalent per year.  With 35 people in the company, that gives me a personal share of around 11.7 metric tones of CO2 equivalent per year.  The calculations get pretty foggy at that point, but roughly speaking, all of my travel alone should barely fit within that limit.  Yikes!

Anyway...back to the task at hand...

The eight men on the and nine women on the Olympic Long Team will be focusing intently on burning serious fossil fuels to get to those World Cup events in order to secure a starting spot at the London Olympics.  Only 2 men and 2 women will be selected from the Long Team, and that selection will be based primarily on individual performances in these four rounds of the World Cup.  Game ON!

Needless to say, the preparation for these events is already well underway.  Most racers, including myself, turned off the gas for a bit after last year's World Championships in September, but due to the early start of the Olympic year, resumed training in November.  

I've arrived at this point in career mostly under my own direction on training.  I have receiving some very formative guidance from good friend and fellow Kona lifer Erik Tonkin and Team S&M.  With a goal like the Olympics, I am working formally with the top-notch trainers at Herriott Sports Performance in Seattle.  Their list of clients for strength and conditioning includes 2011 Tour de France Champion Cadel Evans and his BMC Race Team!

A corner of the HSP Training Facility

Trainers for when music, movies and fans are more inspiring than the cold rain and snow

Power Squared: Weights + PowerBreather

Lactate Threshold testing - pain face not due to prick of blood from the ear

  And of course...LOTS of bike riding.  Most recently, a great block of offroad riding in Bellingham, WA in Kona's backyard, and a few beautiful days at home in the Columbia River Gorge:

The Syncline near Lyle, WA

My dad is still good for an off-the-couch surge to the top of the Syncline and singletrack riding all day

It doesn't get much better than a sunny day in the Gorge...

Stay tuned for this weekend's 24 Hours of Old Pueblo in Tucson, AZ.  It's a major event for Kona, and I'll be joining the team (Barry, Kris, Sean, Slaven, and others) for a long day in the desert.

Thanks for reading.  

      

Reality check! (a cool one)

Have you ever wondered what happens when you have to sign up to compete in the Olympics?  I have!  Since I was, like, 8.  So today, I was pretty excited when I saw THIS in my inbox: 

Most of my friends are probably tired of hearing this story, but I'm still excited about it.  So...for those of you interested, a bit of recap:

As some of you may recall, all of that running around last year -- ramping up the training schedule, taking time off from full-time work, traveling to Europe for the first time, competing in the World Cup events, making it back onto the World Championship team -- was in pursuit of a spot on the US Olympic Long team for the 2012 Summer Olymipcs.  Well...on December 1st, 2011, I became 1 of 8 men selected by USA Cycling for the Olympic Long Team!  All that running around (even getting punched in the face in Germany) paid off.

So what does it all mean?  I am in the final pool of riders from which the Olympic Team will be selected on June 25, 2012.  Only 2 men from the Long Team will be able to start at the Olympics this August.  The final selection from 8 to 2 will be based on the top riders in the first four rounds of the World Cup.  There's no guarantee YET that I will make it to the starting line at London 2012, but in the grand scheme of things, I'm darn close!

Thus, my modus operandi of late is to become 1 of those 2 guys.  If I ACTUALLY made it to London, it would be a "Cinderella story outta nowhere"!  Don't get me wrong - for me this is a thrilling pursuit of a lifelong goal that, in the last two years, has continued to progress, step-by-step, and I don't doubt myself.  But considering the competition I'm up against, and all the work ahead, well, as the Carl Spackler once said...gunga galunga.

I'm pulling all the stops this year.  I started training in November.  I'm part-time hourly at Ridgeline Energy starting February 1st, so that I have time to train and travel, but the bills will still get paid.  I'm watching what I eat, getting lots of sleep, and working on my breathing every morning.  I even got a coach! It has been satisfying to have made it to this point on my own program, but now, with a "chance of a lifetime" goal, I need to step up to the same level as the competition and get some help from the pros.  This year I am working with the awesome crew at Herriott Sports Performance in Seattle.  They will help me to be as fast as possible by the time the first World Cup rolls around in March.  And of course, I'm riding Kona Bikes!

Lots of bike riding!!!  When the snow showed up recently in Seattle...

I used some miles to get a ticket to Arizona...

 And trained for 34.5 hours in 8 days...all in the SUN

The pic above is from the last couple days of the trip, riding in Sedona, AZ with fellow Long Teamer and Giant Rabobank racer Adam Craig.  The previous six days were spent in Tucson, the unofficial training camp for several other members of the Olympic Long team, including Todd Wells, Sam Schultz, Chloe Woodruff, and Stephen Ettinger.  Most of those hours were spent aboard my trusty new King Zing

That's Giant rider Carl Decker in the background.  Being the mountain bikers that we are, we couldn't stay on the asphalt the whole time, and one day did an epic ride over the back side of Mt. Lemmon...

And to feel closer to Seattle, we found some snow...

Evidence of some substantial elevation change...

And good food at the end, thanks to the crew at The Cycling House

And lots more open road each day...

After 8 days well-spent in Arizona, the tan lines are back, and I'm looking forward to the start of the race season.

Thanks for reading.  More to come soon!      

Fun at Home

With all the bike race travel that happens from March to September, it's a welcome treat to have a race so close to home...no packing, driving or flying is required.  This last Sunday was the final race of Seattle's MFG Cyclocross Series, held in the idyllic cyclocross venue at Seattle's Woodland Park - and a convenient 5-minute spin from my house.  Seven hundred seventy-seven racers came out for the races on Sunday (according to the Ballard News Tribune).  Cyclocross Magazine did an official write-up of the race, so you can get those details HERE!

The highlights of the day included:

• Being able to pedal to the race from my house
• Watching Sarah Butsch and Liam Voorhees each compete in their first cyclocross race EVER
• Taking the win in front of a hometown crowd

Sarah looking experienced after 10min, owning the run-up and on her way to winning Beg. Women's field.  First 'cross race, and second bicycle race ever.

Liam Voorhees blazing along in his cyclocross debut

Taking the win

Thanks photographer Mike Hone for the shots (mikehone.com)

Rossland BC video shoot

The old saying, "ride it like you stole it!", may be aptly substituted with, "ride it like you're in a video shoot!!"  That may be a commonplace idea for the regular stars of freeride films and ski movies, but for your average spandex-clad,  cross country racer, it's quite the novelty.  Being filmed from a chasing helicopter while tearing down a frosty, snow-covered ridge-top trail was key to inspiring the new saying.  That's what I decided this weekend on assignment with Kona Bicycles for filming the next installment of House of the Big Wheel, Kona's shred-inspiring presentation of their big-wheeled mountain bikes.

LOCATION: Rossland, BC
TRAIL - Seven Summits Trail, IMBA Epic, check it out!

View Larger Map

Jet fuel...check.  With dollar signs literally falling out of the helicopter with each chop of the blade, it was a money-saving and time-saving plan to bring the fuel-stop to the top of the mountain, rather than have the heli fly back and forth to an airport.

That's Derek Frankowski, co-producer of Life Cycles.  He shot stills for the weekend.  Videographer Eric Crosland worked his magic while hanging out of the helicopter all day long.  It was a privilege to work with such  accomplished artists who have done so much to bring our sport to the magazine stands and silver screen for the last several years.

Foggy down low

Breaking through

All clear at the top of Red Mountain

To get to the first shooting location, "standard ride time is 2hrs, you boys need to be there in 40min, chopper's comin' in...here's a map"...

Barry Wicks, on location, fresh snow, elev. ~7,000'

Chopper...Old Glory in the background

Barry & Eric setting up for the day

Kona Team Chopper - Bell 206 JetRanger - gross weight ~1,870lbs

By the end of the day, Barry and I rode between 40k and 50k of epic trail between shoot locations.  It would have been an incredible day of riding without the whole helicopter element.  Barry aboard his Hei Hei 29 Supreme, me aboard the new carbon King Kahuna 29 with the team race build, weighing in at a scant 21lbs.  Getting chased by a helicopter while riding world-class trail through the Kootenay Mountains was pretty fantastic.  A major highlight of the off-season, and a highlight of the year in general.

The action shots and footage should be ready in the next couple weeks, and they're sure to be impressive with the likes of Eric and Derek behind the lenses.  And Mitchell Scott, too (Kona Global Communications Director), who arranged and directed all of the logistics for the entire weekend, and photographed the action as well.

Kona has been doing great things for mountain biking since they started in 1988.  I was flattered to be a part of the story this weekend.  We speculated that this just might be the most epic footage of pure, spandex-clad cross-country riding in the last decade, maybe ever...at least since the seminal Chainsmoke, released by Giant Leap Films in 1996.  My friends and I must have watched that movie almost every weekend during summer of 1998 when we first discovered mountain biking.  So much in the sport has changed since then, but the feeling at the end of a day of great riding...feels the same as when I was 14.

2011 Worlds - Wrapping up the Season

And that’s a wrap!…for the 2011 mountain bike season anyway. Two weeks ago I competed in the elite World Championships in Champéry, SUI as a member of the US National team. This was my second consecutive attendance to Worlds, and the normal electric atmosphere was amplified (at least for me) by the insanely beautiful location of the race venue, nestled into an “alpine cathedral” in the Swiss Alps.

Photo Credit: Colin Meagher/Pinkbike

Last year, my berth to Worlds in Mt. St. Anne, QC was more of a Cinderella story outta nowhere, having balanced my full time job at Ridgeline all season long, racing for Erik Tonkin’s Team S&M, and really just thinking a trip Worlds was a long shot.

The 2011 season was different. First of all, the idea of qualifying for Worlds was no longer a completely daunting prospect - I knew I could do it. To back it up, I earned a rookie spot on the Kona Factory Team , complete with top-of-the-line equipment, support at races, and the confidence boost of being a member of an internationally recognized company and team. Kona has a storied history of supporting great riders (riders whose accomplishments I aspire towards). My approach to racing is a good fit with the company - it's as much to do with the story as it is with the racing, and not all about results - the Team S&M approach is the best way to describe it.

In 2011 I also gained the support of my company, Ridgeline Energy who, after learning of my accomplishments in 2010 and my aspirations to pursue a campaign for the London Olympics, supported me in establishing a balance between work and racing. Having worked at the company for three years while balancing a growing race career (albeit slow growth), we arranged a scenario for me to reduce to part-time starting in June. The reduction in office commitment allowed me the time to travel to key qualifying events, and Veolia even helped to support a portion of my travel expense! Ridgeline should have been in last month’s issue of Outside Magazine in their article on the 50 Best Jobs in the country.

With such a huge increase in support, I was able to focus, for the first time ever, on attending the full World Cup and domestic US Cup tour. The increased travel would be a big challenge and learning experience in itself, but either way, Worlds was in the plan from the beginning, and the new "Cinderella Story" goal became a spot on the Long Team for the London 2012 Summer Olympics! Thus, my focus during the 2011 season (besides having fun training and racing) was to pursue a campaign for London, however much of a long shot…and that meant initiating myself to traveling and racing in Europe.

For those curious, the World Championships is, in the context of elite Olympic format cross country mountain bike racing, the most prestigious international event of the season (unless it is an Olympic year!). Like the Olympics, countries select only a small number of their top riders to compete, and instead of wearing their professional team kit, everyone dons the colors of their country. Worlds is held in a different location every year. For elite cross country, the US selected 7 men and 7 women to race in Champéry. For an underdog like me, just to race in the World Championships is a thrill and an honor.

SO…formal context out of the way…the race! How was it? With all of the build up and prep this year, I felt less distracted by the experience (the “holy sh!% I made it!!” feeling), and more prepared for regular business. That said, there wasn’t much regular business about the course in Champéry.

The start - Photo Credit: canadiancyclist.com/Cycling News

15,000+ fans made a wall of sound as we hammered up the first climb - Photo Credit: canadiancyclist.com

Totally awesome and gnarly! 7.5 laps of roots, mud, wet rocks, drop offs, insane crowd, heinously steep climb, all in under 2 hours, starting #104 out of some odd 111 top-notch racers.

My fabulous call-up position...(seems my tradeoff for learning how to compete internationally was learning how to do the travel and setting myself up for improved results in the future, but this year, not quite making “the top 60 club”, which earns you a good start position).

Starting from the back is still rough. It's more a game of luck than skill. But it makes passing fun…but passing was TRICKY on a course with so much slippery root terrain, the kind of sections which, if you don’t maintain the right momentum, you end up riding like a small child fresh off training wheels.

This is not me...but a good example of the rough terrain - Photo Credit: canadiancyclist.com

Hammering 120% on the short climbs is a tactic to make up lost ground, but the downside is that you are that much more gassed for the ensuing technical section, which takes almost as much energy to ride smoothly. Meanwhile, the guys in front (who are already faster), are riding at a relatively steadier pace. In general, for mortals like myself, there is lots of excess energy and luck required for starting in the back. To make things even harder, the rain hit two laps in. I raced my heart out, and I fought up to 66th before being pulled with 2 laps to go (I had fallen more than 20% behind the leader, so was pulled before being lapped). Sitting on the side of the trail panting and all muddy, I had a moment of feeling pretty diminutive watching would-be World Champ Jaroslav Kulhavy fly by looking cool and collected. But soon enough I settled on feeling fairly proud that I had made it this far, given my all in 2011 the best I knew how, and after everything I have learned, ready to do even more in 2012.

I exchanged muddy high fives after the race with good friend and fellow American Adam Craig, both of us feeling glad to be through with it and looking forward to some beer and Swiss cheese back at the team hotel. After packing up and farewells to the US Team and staff, Sarah and I rolled off to Kona Europe headquarters in Geneva, where we’re gonna celebrate the finish of the season with a few days of awesome riding and rest in the Alps. After that, it's back to work at Ridgeline in Seattle, some cyclocross racing, some REST!!, and eventually, lots of planning and preparation for the 2012 season.

The Kona office/showroom in Geneva

P.S....if you tried to watch the race on Freecaster and were blocked by the 30 Euro pricetag, you can now watch the race for FREE...CLICK HERE!