2015: Year of the Bike?

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; 
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; 
a time to kill, and a time to heal; 
a time to break down, and a time to build up; -Ecclesiastes 

Had I as an adult settled near the Southern California home where I grew up, I'm sure the idea of a cycling 'season' would be foreign to me.  Three hundred days a year of sunshine and 70+ degree temperatures offer lots of ride opportunities and really no 'off' season.  Great for a guy with a bike and some discretionary time on his hands. But despite what those of the septuagenarian set will tell you, it's also quite tedious, truth be told.  I could (but promise I won't) spend an entire blog writing about why I enjoy the predictable changing of Nature's Guard at Arms as Winter gives birth to Spring, Spring's adolescent vigor grows into Summer's productive, verdant splendour, which passes nostalgically into Autumn; Nature interpreting the gray hairs of maturity through the iconic colours of Fall. There's poetry in the change and while I don't fancy myself a poet, I appreciate the symmetry and cadence of a well constructed verse. And that's what a four season year feels like to me: a complete story with prologue, body and epilogue as opposed to the monotony of a  never ending, never changing narrative.  All pretty words and heartfelt appreciation aside, it still doesn't change the fact that I can't ride my bike in February.  So, in the words of poet/philosopher, David Crosby (or possible Steven Stills or Graham Nash... feeling too lazy even to google it):  "If you can't be with the one you love (honey), love the  one you're with."  And the one we were with in the early days of 2015: Year of the Bike, year in which Jennifer planned to shelf her Imelda-esque collection of running shoes and pursue the acme of Inter-Mountain area cycling achievements: The Triple Crank,* was the run.

*More, much, much more on this later. http://www.utahtriplecrank.com/#!

Unlike years past when I have spent pre dawn hours sweating on stationary bikes, gritting my teeth through spin classes or trying with mixed results to mimic interval training on an elliptical machine, this winter my once yearly foray into running (ie the Park Village Turkey Trot) had legs (so to speak) and lasted well past the last mud brown leaves of late November and into the slush and snow of December, the de facto hibernation season for most cyclists.  I bought a pair of actual, not on sale at Costco for $30, running shoes and hit the pavement.  And (and) actually found myself enjoying it.  I don't know if I ever fell truly and completely in love, but I did develop a proficiency of sorts (ie I ran for more than three weeks in a row without injuring myself) and eventually got faster, not just enjoying it but actually looking forward to runs.  Jennifer parlayed a gifted by Shauna entry into the Yellowstone Half Marathon last summer into a free registration for the Zion half marathon this Spring.  She asked if I wanted to join her and I agreed.  Jennifer (and if you know her you know she has never been accused of allowing the grass to grow under her feet) after narrowly missing last May, has her eyes on qualifying for Boston this Spring at the Ogden Marathon (Hey, what about the Year of the Bike?  Good question, we'll get back to that) and the Zion half would be a training run for her.

So mid-March, we packed the van the kids and some cousins and headed to my brother's house in St George.  The race was actually a lot of fun. Fun for Jenn because she was just out enjoying herself, taking in the scenery and pushing just hard enough to feel like she accomplished something when she finished.

It was fun for me because though it was no PR performance (lots more hill and climbing than they advertised, lots) I still finished in the top 15% of runners for age, gender and overall. That's unheard of for me.  Most bike races, if I am on my game and pushing beyond what I feel my soft-bellied, receding hairlined, mid to late forties body is capable of, I still finish mid-pack canting toward low 40th percentile on the bell-shaped curve even on my very best days. Jenn's journeyman, taking the guided tour effort also put her in the top 20% across the board.  Which is why she will qualify for Boston on flat roads and I will have to find a run that starts on top of Pike's Peak if  I am ever going to accomplish the same thing (more on that later too).

Back to the Year of the Bike.  Sometime last summer, the how and why of it happening is hardly as important the fact that it did happen Jenn decided she would do the Triple Crank.  That we would in fact do it together.

What exactly is the Triple Crank and what must one do to achieve it did you ask?  Well I'm glad you did.  For some of you this may be new material, for others who have already read and heard and especially to those who have plans make the attempt a refresher course is never a bad idea. Forewarned is forearmed as the saying goes.

The Triple Crank is not a race but rather an award given to any cyclist that in one summer takes down Utah's version of the Hydra: the three heads of this particular dragon consisting of:

June 13th -14th The Rockwell Relay Moab to St George



As it's name suggests, this is a team event.  A four person relay race, one rider on the bike at all times for 30 hours straight if you're fast, 36 hours straight if you're not (and in four tries we have always come closer to not than to fast) through three National Parks, over two mountains that top out above 10,000 feet and over 525 miles (850 km) of the most gloriously desolate country the conterminous United States has to offer.  The combination of distance, headwinds, isolation, heat, cold, oxygen deprivation, sleep deprivation, caloric depletion and proximity to three other athletes sharing the intimacy of suffering together for a common goal, trivial as it may seem to a purely objective observer, give the entire adventure a surreal, transcendent quality that you absolutely have to experience personally to understand.  I've tried (at least four times now) to describe it to Jenn.  She does not do overnight events, as she has explained to many a Ragnarian who has invited her to join their team, but for this (for me?) she has made an exception. The barrier of  overnight racing having been breached, the rest of the Triple was as inevitable as the two day head stuffed with cotton, legs made of brick hangover that follows the Rockwell Relay.

Head number two of this surly beast is:

The Tour of Utah Ultimate Challenge August 9th

The most challenging stage of the race dubbed America's Toughest Stage Race.  It is a bar fight disguised as a bike ride, one that leaves you feeling beat up, bewildered and willing to give your bike away to anybody who will agree to never give it back to you, no matter much you beg and plead.  It's an opportunity for amateurs to experience for one indelibly memorable afternoon what pro riders experience for days and days on end.  The route varies year to year but the few constants are at least 100 miles (160 km) of distance 10,000 feet of climb and a mountain finish at the top of Little Cottonwood Canyon.  The latter of which is roundly considered the most difficult canyon climb in a Valley full of canyon climbs.  The steepness of the road and misery or the August afternoon heat is ameliorated by more than a thousand racing aficionados who show up in carnival dress  to cheer you on, hand you up cold drinks, donuts, popsicles, pickles or whatever whatever else is handy and hand-up-able. And then giving you encouraging (and in my opinion crucial, especially at the section they mockingly dubbed Tanner's Flat) pushes on the bum.  The entire experience would be crazy fun if you hadn't been in your personal pain cave so deep and for so long that you wonder if your skin has lost its pigment.  The year I did the challenge we rode 108 miles (170 km) and climbed 10,800 vertical feet.  This year's route eclipses even that with 111 miles (175km) of riding and 13,000 feet of climbing including the notorious Marsac Avenue (with it's dreaded 15% pitches) ride out of Park City and up over Guardsman pass.

Yeah.

And lastly, but hardly least-ly, the final head of this unholy trinity:

The LOTOJA Classic September 7th

LOTOJA is a road race inspired by the one day Spring Classic rides of Europe like Paris-Roubaix or Leige-Bastogne-Leige.  It's an endurance event for endurance enthusiasts.  The route covers more than 200 miles (320km), includes three states, four national forests, three mountain passes and more than two dozen counties from Logan Utah to Jackson Hole Wyoming. Riding it is a Rip VanWinkle-like experience that keeps you in the saddle so long you wonder when you finish if your clothes are still be in style and who the current president of the United States might be.  Improbably (or predictably if you understand cyclists and their penchant for self-punishment) it is one of the most popular cycling events of the year, regularly turning away thousands of would be Lotojans.  Like I said, the original plan was to do all three events together but as LOTOJA registration day approached it became more and more clear that finding a support crew for Jennifer and myself (did I mention the race ends in Jackson Hole?  That makes supporting said race a two commitment, minimum) was not going to be a possibility so I did the right thing.  I've done LOTOJA four times now (which means Jenn has been my support crew--four times) so I stepped back from team Larsen and signed on for Team Jenn.  Plus (and this should be said) supporting Jenn is always enjoyable because unlike me, she is generally contending for a spot on the podium, if not overall certainly for her age group.  At least that's been the case in the two Triathlons she has done.  I will be interested how she fares against her cycling peers.  Like most events that involve both speed and endurance, being small of stature and mass is a favourable condition.  In comparison to other athletes she competes against Jenn is neither of these things.  Even at her race weight she is still 5'9" tall.  Nothing you can do about the mass, even when it's lean mass, that accompanies a frame that size.  And there's no doubt it will hurt her, especially on hill climbs like the one pictured above but she is is strong, both physically (and when it comes to her legs prodigiously so) and mentally. She possesses and makes the most of an iron will, indomitable spirit and laser focus.  Once she makes something her goal, she locks in on it and tracks it, studies it, trains for it and comes to any event she has decided matters to her with the preparation necessary to succeed.  I've said it before (and will again), I'm still impressed with her efforts but I've stopped being surprised by her results.  So I will accept my role as LOTOJA support and spend the latter part of summer training for the St George marathon in October* with an eye (really a pie-in-the-sky dream) of qualifying for Boston and running it with Jennifer in 2016.

*Only it turns out that the cutoff to register for Boston (assuming, of course you qualify to do so) is September 8th, a full month before the St George marathon which means we have to find and register for (sigh) another marathon, one that takes place before the second Monday in September and (hopefully) features a log chute style run down the side of a mountain.  What did we decide about Pike's Peak.  Do they have a marathon?  If so, when?  Also (also) am I the only one that has noticed that the year of the bike features an awful lot of running?  Yeah, what's up with that?

All of those plans and preparations were just that until this finally arrived a couple weeks ago:

Now it's official:  Triple Crank here we come.   

But first there was the matter of the Ogden Marathon and Jenn's follow up attempt to qualify for Boston.  That is a stand alone story that needs to be told (and has been by the runner herself, with commentary from her cheering sections and support crew... that would be me) It's the next entry in this summer's training blog.  I'll warn you now, it's long.  It is, after all, a marathon.  Or at least one runner's marathon story.  And it's a good one.  Worth your time and worth a read.  

As for the Year of the Bike (and the blog that bears its name) it will return with actual, you know, bikes and tales of people riding on them, in the middle of June with a report on our Rockwell Relay experience and the first leg of Jenn's Tripod o' Torment the Triple Crank.

Until then, cheers.