Deer Trail Road Race April 29, 2006

This race was challenging for many reasons, but overall it was an epic day. I would say that this year's race was probably 10 times harder than last year. Congratulations to Casey who finished 13th and Andrei who finished 26th; Strong Work! Those are both great finishes with a hard race like today. We had rain, hail/sleet, sunshine, clouds, and our favorite; wind! Our plan to attack, attack, attack, was only carried out by Andrei, who seemed to be off the front every time I looked up. The pace of the race started out as expected with most everyone soft peddling the first time out to Agate. Then we hit the headwind and made about 15 mph on our way back to Deer Trail. I spent most of this time riding near Chaz, and I think Tim, Casey, and Jeremy were just a little behind us Andrei was a moving target, and I never saw Shuka, (His riding is stealth like or maybe he has an invisible cloak?) although I know he is always close by. The race got interesting our second time out to Agate. We had a nice tailwind and everyone started hammering. It broke the field up well and left many of us chasing hard to catch up. Once everyone came back together we settled in and prepared for another journey into the headwind on our way back to Deer Trail. This time a few guys made a successful break and gained 1-2 minutes on the group. When we got back to deer trail and made it under I-70 we were told that the breakaway group had us by one minute. At this time, Jeremy, Andrei, and Casey made their way to the front to start the chase....although Jeremy later told me he went to the front so that he could get a coke when we went through the feedzone :) The field hammered through the feedzone and with each climb more and more people were left behind. This opened gaps frequently and required extra effort and navigation skills to maintain position. My plan was to team with Andrei, Jeremy, and Casey on the last climbs so we could save Casey's legs for the finish, but I was barely able to hang on to the back of the front group, and finally threw out the anchor when we hit the headwind after the last turn. From what I could see the front group slowly littered the highway with cyclists on the way back to the finish line and the final group to finish I think only had about 10 guys left. Casey was the first man to finish behind the lead group. He finished strong leaving the three men trying to suck his wheel in the dust. I could see Andrei just up ahead of me in a small group, but I could never catch them. It was a great carrot to chase, but this time I went home hungry!

Unfortunately, I was pretty useless this race (I guess traveling to Europe for 2 weeks, living at sea level, drinking lots of wine, and inhaling tons of 2nd hand smoke was not the best training plan....but it was fun!) I tried to conserve as much energy as possible throughout, but having to chase at 35 mph for several miles the second time towards Agate definitely took something out of me, then after we hit the feedzone my heart rate didn't drop below 170 bpm until I crossed the finish line. Unfortunately, soloing the last section made my life miserable until I was finally able to team up with 3 other guys to share some of the effort. Myself and another guy bared the brunt of the work in the group, so we got out sprinted at the finish. Overall, I was 32...and I guess considering everything I should be happy with that.

Cherry Creek Time Trial - Week 3

The Cherry Creek Time Trial series continued today. Map of Race Course. It was a beautiful April afternoon with a temperature of 70 degrees, and the typical wind gusts of 20-30 mph. This was my second official attemp at the course. I tried to go hard from the start, but I could quickly tell that taking 10 days off the bike, traveling to sea level, and inhaling tons of second hand smoke from the Europeans was not the best way to train for this race.
The race started into the wind, which made for a painful first 12.5 minutes. Overall I finished 29th in the Category 4 race group at 26minutes 51 seconds (winner in at 23min 23sec). A little slower for me compared to last time, but overall I am pretty happy with the result. Dugan finished right behind me at 27 minutes (I still think he is holding back). Check out his result from the Boulder Beer Race....He was on the podium! A great finish for Casey and Swift Cycling! Our next race is this Saturday at Deer Trail....look for our results coming soon.

Here are my stats from the race:
Temp: 70 degrees
Altitude: 5446
Lap Time: 26min 36sec
Distance: 10.5 miles
Avg Speed: 23.1 mph
Max Speed: 35.2 mph
Cadence Avg: 79 rpm
Cadence Max: 103 rpm
Avg Min/mile: 2.3
HR Max: 190 bpm
HR Avg: 181 bpm

Portugal Trip - Part 2

Descriptions Coming SOON!

Trip to Portugal - Part 1

Jennifer and I spent the last 10 days in Portugal with one of those days spent in the border cities of Spain (No pictures of Spain, because our camera batteries died as soon as we crossed the border). We had an absolute blast. We spent the first 5 days traveling though the southern region (Algarve region) of Portugal and enjoying vacation time. After that it was back to Lisbon and back to work as Jennifer had to attend the HIV Pharmacology/Pharmacokinetic Workshop meeting. She was one of the big speakers at the meeting, and she did a great job presenting her research, so it was a great career booster for her.

After we finally got the rental car situation figured out, we stopped at the town of Alcacer de sal on the way down for lunch. This was a rural town on the interior of Portugal and gave us a great chance to try speaking Portuguese, since no one there could speak English. We spent several minutes just trying to figure out what foods were on the menu....Luckily we both ended up ordering something edible.
We continued our trip south and stayed at the Tivoli Marinotel in the town of Vilamoura. This was a 5 star European hotel. We were in the honeymoon suite...which for this hotel meant you got a queen size bed instead of two single beds. We did have a nice deck overlooking the ocean and they gave us a free bottle of champagne which we quickly drank.
From Vilamoura we traveled to the Portugal towns of Faro, Tivira, Portomao, Lagoa, Lagos, Sagres, and Monchique, as well as some other small towns. These towns were great examples of the new Portugal that has developed since the big Tsunami and Earthquake that demolished most of the coastal of Portugal in 1755. While visiting we were able to take advantage of several excellent portugal wines, which are very reasonably priced at about 4 Euro per bottle. They have very sweet wines in both red and white varieties. The wineries themselves were much less mainstream when compared to wineries of Napa or Sonoma valley. Most of the wine tasting/selling areas were located in old run down buildings.....I guess I should be glad that they spend more of their money and time making good wine rather than trying to impress visitors with elaborate tourist traps. Anyway, that should give you a little idea of what we did in the southern region of Portugal. Look at my next post of our visit to Lisbon.....

Cherry Creek Time Trial - Race #1

The Cherry Creek Time Trial series started today. Map of Race Course. It was a beautiful April afternoon with a temperature of 72 degrees, and unfortunately winds of 20-30 mph. This was my first time trial, and I didn't really know what to expect. I tried to go hard from the start, but also save just a little for the finish. The race started into the wind, which made for a painful first 12 minutes. I was trying so hard to position myself in an aerodynamic position that I was practically kissing my steering tube at times. The second half of the race was more enjoyable a there was a slight tailwind, although it didn't seem to be as strong as the headwind on the way out :(
Overall I finished 20th in the Category 4 race group at 26minutes 36 seconds (winner in at 23min 25sec, WOW that is fast). Since this was my first time racing the TT, it was a personal best....and hey, I will take 20th any day of the week.

Here are my stats from the race:
Temp: 72 degrees
Altitude: 5446
Lap Time: 26min 36sec
Distance: 10.5 miles
Avg Speed: 23.4 mph
Max Speed: 32.8 mph
Cadence Avg: 81 rpm
Cadence Max: 103 rpm
Avg Min/mile: 2.33
HR Max: 192 bpm
HR Avg: 182 bpm
Total Heart Beats: 4898 (yikes!)

Madison Thomas Brooks is born

I just heard from my good buddy Bobby this morning and he and Natalie had a little boy on Sunday, April 9th. Everyone is healthy and doing well. For those of you that don't remember, here is my previous post on the baby. Congratulations to Bobby and Natalie Brooks! Bobby was of course very busy when I talked to him, so I didn't have much time to get details. I will update this post when I hear from him again later this week, and also add some pictures.

Koppenberg Circuit Race

This was my first race of the year. Jennifer and Cori were there to cheer us on.

The Koppenberg was a great race for the Swift Cycling Category 4 riders. The race started as expected with everyone hammering into the first corner, but unexpectedly we hit a 30+mph headwind that immediately smashed the front of the group. One guy beside of me said "What the F" and tried to make a quick move up the right side to quicken the pace.....I couldn't help but smile as the wind quickly blew him back into the pack. We worked well as a team and stuck to our game plan on the first lap. We had 4 or 5 guys still in the front group as we crested the climb and Casey, Geremy, and I (and maybe Shuka-although his riding was rather stealth like and I did not see him most of the race) were able to ride in the front pack until the very last lap. The 3rd time up the climb was tough, people were scattering with fatigue and we caught three riders that were going at a much slower pace and somewhat blocking the easier riding lanes on the climb. Casey got into great position on the front left, but in doing so burned a much needed match since immediately after making the right turn a guy attacked on the far left side and got about 100 yards ahead. The left part of the pack responded, but the guys on my side were slow to react, so a nice gap was opened. I caught up with Casey and was attempting to close the gap, but both of us were pretty gassed at that point. We caught the front pack at the turn by Costco, but it was single file and the pack quickly split into smaller groups as we hit the dirt and headwind for the last 2 miles. We attempted to catch the leaders, but couldn't really make any progress. They were so close, but no matter what we did they stayed the exact same distance ahead. I ended up finishing 16th on the sheet they posted after the race, but I guess they missed 2 people or someone protested, because I am 18th today on the ACA website. Either way, I was estactic with the race and finish. A much improvement from last year. Casey finished right behind me in 21st, and Shuka, Jeremy, Andrei, and Matt finished only a minute or two behind us. For full results and times click here. For another account of the Koppenberg race click here.

Fun times and a great confidence builder for the 4's. It was nice to actually see the first part of our plan actually work.....now we'll work on the rest of them.

P.S. Yes Dugan, secret Ninja training obviously does help with cycling training, but that strategy will quickly lose effectiveness as we hit the longer road races. Time to spend some more time on the bike :)

Casey, Cori, Ty, and Morgan. Morgan previously worked at the hospital with us. This is the first time I had seen him in about a year. He has been busy with his 2 babies.

Cori and Casey....isn't that sweet. How about the wives getting up at 7AM and coming to cheer us on. Props to them!
17% grade, loose dirt and gravel...does it look like I am having a good time? Actually it was a lot of fun....except for the shortage of oxygen and the feeling of my heart about to explode.
This was the 2nd time up the climb. If you look closely you can see 3 swift cycling riders in this picture. Jeremy is the rider on the right. I am in the middle right behind the guy in black and Casey is 4 guys back on the left.