Settling In

Home life has been awesome. Sometimes, the simple pleasure of knowing that I am going to wake up to perfect coffee made in the comfort of my own kitchen is all I need to get a good night's sleep.

Speaking of waking up, I had the once-a-season pleasure of getting to sleep in my own bed and race this past Saturday. Sarah K came up for the weekend to do some Elete work and of course to race, too. We had some good times, although she may beg to differ on a few of those good times as I forced her to partake in my favorite recovery techniques - wicked cold stream soaks and Estim on the globus. Seeing as summer just started about 10 days ago and the snow melt is still raging, the water in all the creeks is COLD. At least that means a good soak takes 10 rather than 15-20 min.

Anyway, the 9th round of the Intermountain Cup at Teton Village went well for me. The legs felt good despite being asked to perform during a heavy training block and especially well because the last XC effort I did was at Sea Otter. I got to see a lot of my Jackson pals and the locals definitely put in a good showing. Cary Smith won the pro division by a minute...on a singlespeed. Animal. (He also takes his training tips from Eric.) I managed to win by 4 min or so and was pretty happy with my performance. Of course, there's always room for improvement but I'll take it. It felt good to go that hard again, but I did feel a little bit stunned when I finished after only 1:45 of pedaling. What the heck was I supposed to do with the rest of the day?

With the 7 extra hours of time my body is accustomed to racing Sarah and I went food shopping, leisurely ate our lunches in a quiet park in Jackson, went to a bike shop, went for a soak in Moose Creek, had a BBQ and watched a movie. We were also fresh enough to join the Cycling Junkie, Sourdude and Gabe for a killer 3-hour singletrack hammerfest around Cache Creek in Jackson on Sunday morning.

Ride home from Ashton-great Teton views!

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to do one of my favorite road rides in the world, one that I had yet to do all year. I think I can count the number of times I have ridden my road bike since Tucson on my hands alone. Anyway, the ride out to Ashton from Driggs is just awesome - a consistent 40 miles of rollers to get there and of course more of the same on the way home. The scenery alone made my objective of 4 hard hours more enjoyable than usual. Very low traffic, too.

I am sure that will all change leading up to the July 4th weekend. Glenn Beck is coming to Driggs to speak on the 3rd because around here you cannot celebrate the 4th on a Sunday. Yikes. Then, Widespread Panic is also playing down the street at the Spud. Double yikes. I momentarily thought about renting my house out for the weekend's festivities and then couldn't decide which demographic I trusted more - conservatives or dirty hippies. I kid, I kid. Thankfully, I am heading out of town for the Firecracker 50 so I will not be subjected to mayhem!

Phase II

Time to play where's Amanda again. It's been one of those months where I forget where I am when I wake up in the morning. Starting May 31 it went like this: Victor, ID to Fort Collins, to Denver, to Ohio for the Mohican, back to Denver, a few days in Frisco, CO, back to Denver, out to Monterrey, CA for a wedding, back to Denver, up to Leadville, over to Breckenridge and back home to Victor just 3 days ago. It makes me tired just looking at my trajectory for the last few weeks.

Finally getting to ride the good trails in Fort Ord.
Sea Otter never goes near the best riding.

However, it's been a month full of amazing rides at altitude, spending time with great friends both new and old, visiting with family and also time by myself to rest, think and prepare for the next phase of my season. Phase one went pretty darn well, if I do say so myself. Phase II is going to be another kick in the pants.

Pre-wedding group ride on a rental bike with bald
tires and reflectors. Didn't matter. Cruising with great
friends around Fort Ord was awesome.

My 2010 plan all along has been to do a bunch of long races early (Cohutta, Dirt Sweat and Gears and Mohican), take a break from racing and and then start the second phase of the season all in the name of preparing for Leadville. That means actually having the time to train as I have either been recovering from ultras or tapering for them since late April. I'll kick things off again in a few weeks with the Firecracker 50, then try to get some of my high-end speed back with some XC racing and intensity (the Pro XCT in CO Springs and then XC Nationals) throughout the month of July. The way Eric and I see it, the base is in, now I just need to find some speed! Currently, I can ride at 100 mile race pace for days...but asking my body to go anaerobic is a very painful experience. Must work on that.

Speaking of painful, I was up in Leadville training this past week and forgot how excruciating it is to push hard at that altitude. And I live at 6500 feet. I can't imagine coming from sea level to race the Firecracker, XC nationals or Leadville. On a side note, I do hope that USA cycling changes the location for both marathon and xc nationals next year. It just doesn't seem fair for everyone to have to come up and race there year after year, especially amateurs who cannot take the time off to acclimate before the events.

Pebble beach. My first trip to the area that didn't entail bike racing was sweet.

So, now it's time to settle into the home life, get some cross training in with epic lawn mowing and weeding sessions and actually spend time with my dog and friends. Unfortunately, my timing is a bit off to spend time with the hubby as Nate leaves tomorrow for a 10-day family trip to southern France. Yes, I was invited and yes, I had to turn it down. The way we see it, when I do make my first trip to Europe I want to be able to enjoy the festivities. As we all know, I have a twisted definition of enjoyment. Although 10 days of eating cheese, drinking excessive amounts of wine and sightseeing sounds magical, being in France for the first time and not being able to do some of the infamous epic road and mountain bike rides would be for me, torture. Instead, we are going to save the miles and $$ for a warm-weather getaway in January when I really need to get out of here. Right now, nothing sounds better than home!

Mud-Hican 100 in Photos

Maybe I should just let the pictures do the talking, as it is 2 days later and I am still having trouble formulating coherent thoughts about the event. I got these photos from a nice man named Wade who managed to get me to crack a smile at the finish. I could barely see him at this point.

I am working on a full race report for the Kenda Team blog, so keep an eye out for a better explanation of what really happened out there. Here's a link to the cyclingnews.com race results and report. In short, it rained. A lot. It was at times scary, but also sort of fun in a twisted kind of way. There were chest high stream crossings, a few major mechanicals, a lost contact lens (which was actually just folded in half and stuck in my eyelid), a reevaluation of my hydration plan, thunder, lightening, sideways winds, tornado warnings and a boat load of suffering.

After a tough battle for the first 40 miles, I managed to ride steady and come away with the win! It was hard fought and hands down the worst conditions I have ever encountered. My eyes are still so bloodshot from being filled with mud all day it is a miracle I didn't get questioned at airport security last night about my sobriety or the contents of my carry on!

Post-race brake pads

Best post-race meal ever. Mongolian BBQ!

Super-hail on the deck the day before the race.
Rural Ohio. FYI, no AT&T anywhere close to here.

More hail
The most obnoxious rental car on the planet

More to come, stay tuned!