TDD - Turkey Mountain Festival - 29th September 2019

Turkey Mountain Festival wrapped up the TDD 2019 series. The race was originally scheduled for earlier in the year but due to the weather not playing ball it was rescheduled for the 28th and 29th September, the event is a fundraiser for burn camp to help burn victims, they raised over $5,000 which is great. 

The festival had an omnium race series consisting of a TT and short track race which were held on the Saturday. Due to other commitments the Blades family was unable to make these events. However we did make the Sunday for the final race in the XC series.

Kid's Kup 

First race on Sunday was the kids kup races. Fiona and I got out and prerode the course and she seemed to really like it, vs the last course which she hated.
The race started and Fiona was off the back again during lap one but working hard to try and catch the riders in front of her.
As she started her second and final lap she was in 5th place but managed to pass another two riders to finish in a strong 3rd and on the podium. 

Lap two and putting in some effort

Full gas to the finish

Hi fives :) - thanks for the photo Jennifer Black

I am really proud of her racing this season, we don't get to bike as much as I would like but she has shown some real strength in her riding and finished well whenever we have had time to get a good preride of the course before the race.

Podium and looking for mum :)

The Cat1/2 course

Turkey Mountain actually has a little elevation compared to some of the courses we have been riding, it also has a technical aspect too. The course starts with a climb which by the time we rode had a pretty obvious line all the way up. Then we had a flatter section with a little bit of flow which dropped into a slightly technical descent and then a technical climb. Following this it was more flow sections then a technical descent into a short climb and a longer technical section. The final descent had a small rock drop then flat out flat section to the finish or repeat the lap. It was a 5mile lap. 

I pre rode the course after the kids kup awards, during the cat 2 race. I found the technical sections not to bad and managed to clean all but one of them and saw where I went wrong on that one first time.

The race

Before going into the race I had been doing some number crunching on my season points. I was sitting in 3rd place overall, this is a little strange to me since my best placing has been 4th.  

The only guy who was racing at Turkey Mountain Festival and could catch and take 3rd away from me was Cody Pollard. Cody had a race in hand over me as we do a best of 6 races and was 45points behind me, this meant that if he got top 4 he would be 3rd overall. 

We lined up on the start line and at the whistle we were off. As per usual I took up my role as "sweep" for the cat1 pro/19-39 age group. The guys I race against really do start way faster than I am capable of at the moment. I started the first climb and had the guys ahead of me in sight. I was feeling good, although felt my legs were once again lacking some of their usual power. I am thinking that all the running I am doing is currently having a detrimental effect on my riding but alas I do currently need to do it. 

As I continued and was passed by the various guys from the categories who started behind me I was still feeling ok, just a little under powered. I got into the first technical section and a guy who I had just let past me stumbelled. I jumped off and ran that section. When I got to the next technical section I picked a really poor line so ended up walking a significant chunk of that section too. Then I caught up with Cody, he had a flat, I asked if he needed anything and he said he didn't have a C02 so I stopped and gave him mine, hopefully this act of karma would mean that I wouldn't need it for my race. 

I set off again and finished lap 1, grabbed my bottle and continued into lap two of four. This lap was a disaster for me, my heart rate monitor decided to stop working, I didn't make it through any of the technical sections without walking and hit a tree with my right shoulder. 

I did make it around the course though and started into lap number three. This lap went way better than lap 2, I didn't make the first technical section but I did clean the first part of the second one and felt much better all the way through it. before I knew it I was starting into lap four and I hadn't been lapped. 

As I started up the first climb I heard that the race winner was coming across the line, I assumed also by this point that Cody had dropped out since he hadn't passed me. The first climb seemed to go well and although I didn't make it through the first technical section unscathed, yet again I had to dab. I did feel good on the rest of the top part of the course. At the top I stopped to give a pickle juice to a fellow competitor who was suffering with cramps. I enjoyed the downhill and almost made it through the 2nd technical climb but failed at the last moment. Oh well much better than lap 2.
Lap times
Lap One - 31:58
Lap Two - 33:57
Lap Three - 34:18
Lap Four - 35:59
So whilst I was slowing down at least my last lap wasn't 10min slower than my first lap as has happened in the past.

I crossed the line at 2:16:14 which puts me way off the pace of the winner at 1:41:23, i'm also down proportionally to where I usually am at 34% back. I did however, more by luck than anything else manage to seal up 3rd place overall in the series. 

6th Place again. 

3rd place in the series, super stoked. 

The other great thing about the series here is, they do a team points award. The top four racers from each team at each event put points towards this award. It's been a three way battle all season but I am happy to say that Bike Lab came out on top in the final race, for the third year in a row.

2019 TDD Team Champions 3rd year in a row!

The Strava

What did I learn throughout the season

As many people know I like to track data about all my exercise to see what I can learn from it. I also track where I sit in relation to other racers. This season has been tough for me in Cat 1, although the equivalent to what I raced in Alaska, it has found me racing solo a lot. 

In Alaska, although I was in a similar position time wise from the winners, I was mostly racing with people. Here that is not the case, the fields are much smaller and although the racers are fast, albeit not significantly faster than Alaska, I don't feel I am racing them as I rarely see them after the race starts. 

In the early part of the season I feel I was starting to catch the guys ahead of me however, I had a slip in performance for the second part of the season which is totally my fault. I didn't train or even really ride over the summer due to family commitments, and I would probably do the same again, ok maybe I would try and ride a little more.  

I am very happy to have finished off the season in 3rd place, do I deserve that? I sure worked harder than the other racers, ok I rode for a longer time :) But what really got me that position was riding for 6 races. Only five riders in my category did that which, makes me wonder where are the other racers in this 19-39 age group?

Here is a spreadsheet of my finish data from the races I did. I will link up the points when they are updated too. 

They even gave an award to Mort

Yes my dog is a state champion, 3rd place for being awesome.... I think they got the wrong dog as he is vocal but I would honestly class him as being a pain in the butt. He couldn't even stay quiet at the last award ceremony he was at.

See Dad, I am awesome they
even gave me a medal.

TDD - Blackwell Beatdown - 15th September 2019

Another week another race and boy was it a hot one! Sure it wasn't as hot as last weeks and we were fooled into thinking it may be cooler with the shade however there was very little breeze in the trees and I definitely over heated.

Lake Carl Blackwell

Lake Carl Blackwell is near Stillwater and has a 5mile ish singletrack loop which has a little bit of everything. There are a couple of rock drops, a flow section, a little climbing, loose turns on the pine needles and even a dual slalom course. I really enjoy riding there as it ticks a lot of boxes. The newly opened section is a great addition too.

Looking back at the new wooden feature
- photo from preride

My Race

As usual we set off at 1 million miles/hour, I maintained pace down the dual slalom but as we turned the corner and headed up to the finish line I was spit out of the back. Oh well time to individual time trial again and see what I could salvage from the race. I did manage to pass a guy on lap one and we rode similar pace through to the end of the lap where he blasted away from me on the climb up to the finish. I saw him briefly on the remaining laps through the trees, it was nice to have someone to and chase. 

The course was a fun one and I thought I was doing ok on laps one, two and even the first half of lap three then I started to get some twinges in the legs which went on to full cramps on lap four.  

The great news is I finished. Although I definitely didn't finish strong with some good old leg cramps on lap four. I did use bottles with EFS which has been previously working great. I also took a shot of pickle juice during my last lap which although helped i'm sure. Even so I still had to walk a couple of sections on the last lap. Oh well keep working on that whole nutrition and hydration strategy until I get a perfect solution. 

Oooophs crampy lap four

We only have two races left in the season and I have no idea where I am points wise. Today I finished last again which was 6th place I think. I am unsure if I will race next weekend as I have a gravel race on Saturday and the course is another technical one, though I do really like that. The last race of the season is at Turkey Mountain in Tulsa which I am sure will be tough.  

The Strava

TDD - Western Okie - 8th September 2019

After a summer off from mountain biking and well any real biking for me I knew that the remainder of the TDD series was going to be a tough call, four races in four weekends, I really shouldn't have taken the whole summer off. But I did and life goes on. 

Kids Cup

As with previous events Fiona is the first in our family to race, her warmup/sighting lap didn't go well. There was a kid in front of her who kept crashing and it pretty much wiped out any confidence she had. Oh well live and learn, next time I will ride that lap with her.

The course consisted of a grass climb, a dirt/rock singletrack section with a tough push up then a little more singletrack before a grass descent to the finish. Her age group did two laps.

Top of the first climb

Although she wasn't wanting to race after the practice, she did line up and race and ended up taking home 6th place. Her second lap was a significant improvement over her first one as she gained confidence on the course, more practice next time I hope.

6th Place and a bag of swag! 

The Course

People think that its flat out west and in most of Oklahoma to be honest however, my legs were destroyed after the race. There wasn't a lot of elevation change on the course however there was a lot of power sapping grass, rocks and a few ups that I couldn't ride up. I even had to walk one small drop as I completely had a mental block on riding it lap one and didn't improve that on lap two. 

The first part of the course took us across the dam, then we were into a section called the pits which had all the steep ups and downs. After that is was mostly a double track around the lake with some soft sandy corners. We then crossed a metal bridge after which followed a sandy singletrack section which was my favourite part on the course. We then had around 1.5miles to the finish on some more singletrack with a couple of steep downs. 

My race

To reiterate I really hadn't been riding over the summer with travelling and camping so my expectations were low for the race. It was also warmer than I like it to be when racing, however I have at least been riding some evenings in the heat so that I was less worried about. Due to the heat, our race was shortened and I was thankful for this. At the previous race I actually started to feel like my racing was coming together, sure I didn't get close the the podium but at least I was racing with people..

The race on Sunday didn't feel like that at all. Almost as soon as we started I was way off the back.  Oh well, I pushed the pace for my solo ride around the lake two times. At the end of the first lap, a Single Speeder caught and passed me, they started 10 min behind me, next one of my teammates Jeremy Black and a guy he was racing caught me along the dam. I pushed on as hard as my legs would take me and set a new Heart Rate Threshold rate according to training peaks, I haven't updated it. :)

Errrmmm yey?

The best thing from the race, finishing my second lap to the cheers of Amanda and Fiona.

The last technical section.

It was a tough one for me and they stuck it out in the heat to cheer me on which I really appreciate.

Where did I finish? 4th place which is my best TDD result ever though there were only four people in my category.

Yep it was a tough one for me.

Great racing by Eric, Victor and Chad.

Due to the four races in four weeks I can foresee a similar couple of races coming up. Oh well pedal on and keep trying.

The Strava

TDD - Red Dirt Redezvous - 5th May 2019

The next instalment of the Tour De Dirt series took place on Sunday 5th May at Draper MTB Park. There was a significant amount of chatter online before the race due to some significant rainfall throughout the week preceding the event. Draper has lots of sand rather than clay so does drain pretty well however, I think they received 4" of rain throughout the week. The go ahead for the race was finally given before the midday Saturday cut off for cancelling a race. I'm glad we did the race though it was definitely wetter than I was expecting on course in some sections. On the plus side all the local bike shops should be happy with the extra drive trains and bearings they are going to sell :) 

A little about Draper

Draper trails have a lot of flow. So unlike the previous three races, with there endless rocks and technical sections, Draper trails are all about carrying corner speed which I will fully admit I'm not the greatest at. It also has lots of turns, some of which are bermed and some are flat, some start out bermed and end up flat and some start flat then have a berm. If I rode there more frequently I am sure I would get better at remembering which corners I can brake less or not at all for. Anyway it is what it is and here we were on race day with me having not ridden Draper since Thanksgiving. 

Kids Kup

As always with these races for our family, the day starts for us with a Kids Kup race. Fiona is growing more and more in confidence at these races definitely spurred on by getting on the podium. The Kids Kup use a short course track format and all happen before the Cat3 races. 

Todays course was a grassy climb followed by a singletrack descent then back to the grassy climb. The course was 0.29miles long and Fiona's age group did 4 laps.

Waiting to get going. 

Made the podium again
Way to go Fiona!

My Race

After the excitement of the Kids Kup race Fiona and I hung out and ate before my race which is later in the day. This week Fiona's race was all wrapped up by 10:45, I wasn't racing until 12:30 so we had plenty of time to relax and cheer on some cat 3 racers. 

At 12:30 it was go time for me, as usual I am in a very competitive field and once again completely failed to get the wholeshot. 

No wholeshot this time....
I'm far left at the back in this picture

The pace of the guys I'm racing against as always blows me away. There are some seriously fast guys in my age group and the group behind me come to think of it. 

We set off along the trails at warp speed however this week I was able to hang with a couple of the guys (at the back I might add) before the end of the yellow section (first trail we do) I had passed two people. 

I then caught up with another guy and followed him for around 2/3 of a lap as we were similarly paced. I passed him on the orange trail and he followed me for a while before I lost him on a couple of corners. 

I then had around 1/2 a lap riding solo but due to the twists and turns I could see I was catching up a group ahead of me.

One of the best things about having family and friends at these races is the support we as racers receive on the course. Here is a short video of Fiona giving me a cheer at the start of my final lap. 

On the final time through the yellow trail I caught and passed two more riders who were really struggling. I was feeling good and hoped to catch Victor who has on previous courses faded pretty badly looking at his lap times on the final lap. The problem was, I was starting to feel some crampy twinges in both legs. 

I finished my bottle but this time it wasn't helping. As I crossed into the blue trail I stopped to take on some pickle juice. This helped for around two corners but I was still cramping up. I reduced my effort and tried to limit my losses as I rolled the remaining miles to the finish. How much did I back off? There is a Strava segment from the parking lot up a climb and down back to the parking lot.

Here are my times from each lap :-

Lap 1 - 3:55

Lap 2 - 3:58 

Lap 3 4:40. 

I pushed as hard as my legs would go and finished with a smile or was it a grimace, nah it was a smile as Fiona rolled the last 100m with me. I finished in 7th place which is better than I was expecting on the start line. To be honest I am stoked about that, mostly because this race I was actually racing with people not just taking part in a solo time trial, all this training seems to be paying off. 

The Strava

TDD - Ponca City - 28th April 2019

The latest round of the TDD series round 4 was held at Ponca City. By an amazing set of coincidences Amanda was able to join Fiona and I as we took a trip out in Baby Groot. 

The races were based out of the Wentz Camp and pool area though due to it being to early in the season the pool is currently not open. 

The trails at Ponca City are a great mixture of flow and rocky sections. The trails are numbered 1-8 and each trail section has its own character, they all join back up to a gravel access road which would make repeating them easy. It is a super fun trail to ride and with the variety of sections it will improve all of your riding, go ride there! 

We arrived a little later than planned but we still managed to get some riding in.
Amanda and Fiona rode the Kids Kup course and practised their skills over the wooden features. Fiona was not happy that we were forcing her to practice these but, reluctantly did with Amanda's encouragement. Whilst they practiced, I nipped off to ride part of the course. 

Here we are relaxing post ride.

Enjoying the evening

Fiona taking the photo for a change

Fiona's Race

After a relaxing night in Baby Groot we got Fiona registered for her race which started at 9am. 

Here is Fiona's first lap of the race. 

As can be seen she was the only one to ride the wooden features on the first 1/2 of lap one which put her squarely at the back of the group. :( I am stoked that she did, but if I had known that the rest of the group would have missed them, I wouldn't have insisted that she rode them. For the remaining four laps Fiona didn't ride the wooden features on the first 1/2 of the lap and clawed her way back up into second place overall. 

Here she is crossing the line.

Go Fiona Go!

Podium again go Fiona!

I am hopeful one day she will make the top spot of the podium. This day she rode with some real grit which as we will find out later I lacked for my race, see below.

My Race

After seeing Fiona on the podium I went off to scope out segment 3 of the course as advised to do by Corey White. I was glad I did as the section was definitely the most technical of the course. I did manage to clean ride everything though so wasn't to worried about that part of the lap but I was glad I checked it out.

After riding this section, I headed back to Baby Groot for some food then a little warmup before heading over to the start.

At 12pm we set off in the usual fashion of rocket speed, the only difference being this time I was able to hang with some of the guys ahead of me. The first section of singletrack was a little bit of a mess and someone stumbled and I almost had to put a foot down. Next thing the guy in front of me (Victor) crashed. I passed him and was rolling really well. Section 3 rolled up quickly and I let Victor pass me where he then put a little time into me. As we headed to the technical part I caught Victor again and passed him. I cleaned the sections and Victor followed me back onto the access road I grabbed some hydration and let Victor lead into section 4 where we were soon passed by the 4 leaders of the next category back. I managed to stay on this groups wheel as they caught Victor (I stopped to let them pass me) I watched my pacing on the access road and Victor was in sight as I finished the first lap.
Rolling into the first singletrack I managed to hit a rock pretty hard and flat my tyre. I stopped and added some air and carried on, no big deal. Further around the course in section 3 of singletrack I felt my tyre going soft again, damnit then thunk I rim striked. I'm now pretty frustrated but add some more air and continue on my way. Into the next technical section and thunk again. I stop and put more air into my tyre but now mentally I'm spent. I can honestly say this I don't know why. I have had to add air in races before but this time I hit the road and added yet more air and I was done. I DNF'd my first race ever I think. Not a great example to set for Fiona but sometimes things happen.

Looking at the results now, if I had stopped and taken the time to remove the thorns from my tyre and put a tube in I would have probably finished DFL which is not an unusual for me, oh well.

What did I learn this weekend?

It was nice to get away as a family even if only for one night, though I really ought not to forget the bacon next time. 

I felt terrible for quitting however I got a lot of nice comments from friends. I don't think I will quit that easily again but never say never. 

I did buy a new tyre for the rear as I now have no confidence in my rear tyre that I was running after two races with flats.

New rubber

I am feeling strong right now so lets hope that carries forward into the Marathon Nationals in TX on the 11th May. 

Finally, Amanda is way better at coaching Fiona for MTB (really giving her confidence) than I am and Fiona is better at coaching Amanda in the same way Amanda does for her. I need to work on that and getting them both riding more. They are really great when they get going just lacking a little confidence. 

The Strava

TDD - Fools Dozen - 7th April 2019

Round three of the 2019 Tour De Dirt series took us to Medicine Park in Southern Oklahoma. The trails there are pretty rocky and technical which lead to some hard and tiring racing for me.

Fiona's race

Fiona had a tough one today, she is currently lacking a little confidence on singletrack and it showed today during her race. She worked super hard though and brought up the back of the field to take 4th place which is most definitely one place better than me.
We are hoping to try and get out to ride more trails over the next few weeks (weather permitting) before her next race. We also got to ride more post race and she definitely gained more confidence which is what it's all about. 

Frustrated Fiona

Post race almost smiling again

Nick's race

The Cat 1/2 loop took us over some rocky and technical trails. Although the course was short in both distance and time (normally we race for 2+ hours today it was more like 1.5hours) I was not alone in being thankful I only had to race 3 laps, It wore me out.

The course started on an uphill double track before descending and crossing onto a paved road. 

Photo from the preride

We climbed for around 0.25miles on the paved road before joining singletrack for the remainder of the lap. From preriding the course I had identified a few sections where I was struggling. Here is one such section which I didn't even attempt during the race, I just walked as it was faster.

After this section the remainder of my lap was pretty smooth sailing. I made almost every section I had failed during the preride apart from a babyhead section which eluded me. I even made the loose climb on all but my last lap. The race finished at the top of the double track rather than the bottom of the singletrack where we started. I'm very glad I didn't have to sprint against anyone on that as I was totally empty by this point.

Lap Times

Lap 1 - 31:00

Lap 2 - 33:54

Lap 3 - 36:40 though I did stop and back track to pick up TDD numberplate from a fellow competitor which was on the floor Strava says this cost me around 25 seconds 

Here I am descending Itchy Scratchy
- Photo Credit Jennifer Black

One of the things I did notice on my final lap was, I would end up riding at a similar speed to riders I was catching up with rather than just blasting past them. This probably helped me though as it meant I didn't blow up. 

Heart rate plot

Yer.... it was a hard race, there was very little area to recover as the course contains almost no flow sections, you work hard on both the climbs and descents at Medicine Park. Fun riding for sure but tough when you are not used to riding that sort of trail. 

Holy Heart Rate!

Results 

I finished a little sun burnt, very tired and not in last place! I managed to get 5th place which I am super stoked about. Sure the field was only 6 people but for this race at least I wasn't DFL. 

Not DFL

We now have a couple of weeks break from the TDD Series, there are still plenty of rides and training to do though. 

Strava file