Times they are a changing. It’s been a wild few months. I guess I should back up and begin back in April with the Whiskey 50. April is always hit or miss in AZ, but it ALWAYS seems to rain on Whiskey weekend. This year wasn’t too bad. Ominous skies never really opened up and dumped on us like last year and it was in the low 50s by mid morning.

It had been a while since I’ve raced with the top echelon of mtb talent and Whiskey sure served up some big names. I ended up 40th on the day after a little to ambitious start, it was just kind of an off day all together, but I remembered how much different it is trying to race for a W locally versus a top 20 on a national level, a nice primer for Junction.

The Grand Junction Off-Road

Grand Junction was another story. We rolled into town Wednesday and hung out with our friends Kim and Bobby for the weekend. GJ is a really town and the racing kicks off on Friday night with the Fat Tire crit right in the heart of downtown. The race is actually super fun. A flat 10 corner crit that rips right through main street inches from spectators cheering and heckling. It’s probably one of the most fun times I’ve had racing my bike.

Usually crit racing isn’t my thing, but I ended up hanging on to the lead group til the end finishing somewhere around 16th. Saturday I played support crew for Evie and Bobby. They both had great races, Evie got 5th in the open women and Bobby won the open men! Sunday it was my turn.

The course in Junction is rad, super rad. Probably one of the hardest mountain bike courses in the country technically with the big chunky rocks, chutes, and all around physically demanding. The roll out from town is really long, about 10-mins before we hit singletrack. I did my best to be as patient as possible and stay tucked in from the wind. Going into the singletrack things swarmed a bit and when I put in a late dig got jammed up as things funneled down to one lane.

Nonetheless, after the first climb up the Tabby I pulled some spots back and then got to the fun stuff, ripping the Butterknife descent. I made a good 10 or so passes there and then buzzed down to the creek where you start a 45-min climb out up this steep rough jeep road. It’s a tough climb with constant rocks and changes in elevation and this year there was a stiff headwind which made things really really tough. It felt like we were just crawling. I haven’t suffered like that mentally in a long time.

I think I only passed one or two guys going up the climb. The wind really hurt. After another bombing rutted out jeep road descent there’s one last painful climb up some Moab type slick rock before dropping into Andy’s and finishing on the road back into town. I gave it my best, but only managed to come away with a 23rd, only a few minutes out of the top 15 so overall I was pleased with a super fun race and weekend.

MBAA Series Finale

This past weekend we headed to Flagstaff for the MBAA series finale. I decided to race Marathon to try and hold on to my series overall which I managed to do taking 1st on the day and 1st overall in the series. The vibe at the MBAA races is quite similar to WORS. Tons of people, families, kids, good trails, vendors, and and all around great time.

We drove down to Prescott for the night to celebrate at Park Plaza (aka the Liquor Deli) over a beer and wood fired Mac ‘n Cheese with Trevor and Karlene, good WORS friends of ours who are now living in Prescott. It was super fun to mix it up again with Trevor after years of WORS racing together. We even pulled off the 1-2 after 3.5 hours of some tough dusty riding.

Birthday Celebrations

Sunday the four of us went for a super fun ride right from the house for Evie’s birthday and then drove over to Cottonwood to do some wine tastings in the Verde Valley, an area that has completely exploded due to the new wine making over the past 5 or 6 years. All in all it was a great weekend!

A week to recoup and then it’s off to Carson City, Nevada for the Carson City Off-Road, the last stop in the Epic Rides EPIC series. I love that area around Lake Tahoe, but have never ridden there so I’m excited to check it out.

Until next time, cheers!

Once February hit it seemed like things change from Winter to Spring overnight. We haven’t had drop of rain or snow for nearly 6+ weeks. The trails are dry, at least a lower elevations, and the temps have been in the 60s nearly everyday. These conditions made for some great training days and adventure miles.

One of my coolest adventure rides was my 100-mile, 10.000′ el. ride into the Blue Wilderness from Alpine. Reaching 9000+ feet and dropping down to below 6000′ the ride took me from pine trees and snow down to cactus and heat. Pretty cool to have so much variety here in AZ.

Another great ride was the up and over 4 Peaks, another 10,000 el. ride. That’s probably my favorite mtb training ride I’ve done yet.

Our friends Trevor and Karlene moved to Prescott last fall and this past weekend was our first opportunity to get together. We rode in Prescott on Saturday and then Sedona on Sunday. Such a great weekend!

The girls did their own ride Sat. and then Sunday we stopped by the Sedona Mtb Festival, visited with some friends and then took the girls on HiLine one of the harder double black trails in Sedona. They rocked it! We sessioned the chute a few times which made for a fun day of riding in beautiful Sedona.

Lucy the Energizer Doggy

I’ve been slowly training Lucy into shape this winter. I gotta say it’s worked, she’s FAST! After hiking 10-miles with our friend Cristin on Sunday we rode 8+ miles Monday and then another 5 Wednesday and I gotta say I was having a hard time keeping up with HER! By the end of both days I could tell she still had plenty more in her legs. I think she’s ready for the doggy Olympics…

It’s pretty cool to watch her as she mostly runs in front of you on the trail, over logs full speed. Cruising down a fire road section I looked down at my Garmin and we were holding 25+ mph! Needless to say I may have created a little monster :p

Local Racing Picks Up

This weekend is the Fat Tire 40 sponsored by McDowell Mountain Cycles, followed next weekend by MBAA #4 at White Tanks. This week I started my first set of intervals for the season so looking forward to some good training these next few weekends as we get closer to the first bigger race of the season, for me at least, Whiskey 50.

A change up to the course should make this year a great time.

Some photo’s from my recent adventures….

December and January were pretty good months for playing in the snow. El Nino has brought cooler temperature with more precipitation to the Southwest which has been a lot of fun. It’s suppose to stick around all year so that should make for some great riding conditions come monsoon season in the late summer.

That being said, the 15-day forecast shows temperatures in the 50s and 60s so it’s pretty safe to say that the bulk of winter is over. I’m sure we’ll get a mid March or April storm with snow that melts off in a day or two, but otherwise it’s right into spring.

That’s how Arizona does seasons, not much transition time, or at least very little crummy shoulder seasons. You can always ski and/or ride just about any day of the year.

Evie has been skiing a lot, I’ve gone a handful of times (snowboarding) along with some really, really fun fat bike rides.

The snow is mostly melted in town, but the mountain still has a ton. Base miles have begun for mtb season along with a little bit of low intensity racing. Another rider moved to town from Boulder, a former pro who raced for Specialized in the 90s along with racing in Europe in his early years. We’ve got quite the group up along with the NICA kids that are flying!

MBAA Series

The Arizona Mtb series has started up and is already coming into it’s 3rd race. Luckily we have a marathon class which makes putting in some quality base miles relatively easy. Last year I joined the volunteer board as marketing director and this year I’ve been voted in as chair. The guys and gals before me have done an awesome job getting the right people in place to make sure things run smoothly so it’s been fun to be a part of.

I’ve got some bigger rides planned for later this month and more exploring will be had! The Sedona Mountain Bike Festival is the first weekend of March, no doubt that will be an awesome time, plus a lot of people coming down from colder climates to ride and hangout here and there. Arizona is a pretty exciting place! We’re pretty fortunate to live here.

Web Design Projects

Lastly, I’ve had a lot of new clients come way already this year. It’s always super fun working with business owners, uncovering problems, and coming up with solutions. You can check out my latest web design projects and if you or anyone you know needs website help or getting their business found online don’t hesitate to give me a shout.

Until next time!