Cycle City Short Track Series

Well what do you know

http://www.cyclecitykc.com/

All August long. This is great news. Thank you Joe.

UNTITLED

So the horrible news came from Craig Stoeltzing at work on Tuesday. He approached me with a long face and said, "bad news, Landahl is cancelled." Bummer, I was amped for the fixed gear rampage. I do not understand why this race could not get a foot hold, but I understand why Granny Gear pulled out, with not a single team registered.

5 of us had a steller ride at Blue River last night. It was good ol'fashioned MTB fun. Alot of laughing and talking crap, and wrecks, and cleaning sections that we should have wrecked on. We finished at about midnight and I was jazzed enough I did not fall asleep forever. Geez that is the stuff.

Joel and I are rolling south to the Flint Hills this weekend. Death Ride. I hope we live.

And last on the blogging agenda. I have been hearing much talk of Short Track racing in KC. What of it, lets make it happen. Any interested parties contact me and tell me what you want. My tentative idea is a 30 minute race around 7:00 p.m. out at Blue River. We could tag it on to Taco Tuesday or do a whole different night and place. If I do not hear back from anyone I will set a plan and we will race out the summer. If there is four of us cool, three of us we will race, two people it's mano y mano. Just me, I will go ride high line. Plan on next week.

SMP ENDURO

I had been looking forward to the Shawnee Mission Park 3/6 since I saw the schedule come out. Since Amber and I's apartment is a 15 minute pedal from the singletrack I end up there a good bit. I just decided a couple of weeks ago that I wanted to do the 6 hour, I have put in a solid handful of 4+ hour rides, and figured it would be a cool event to try and win. The race started with the traditional Le Mans run, where I promptly felt like my calf was about to cramp up, wonderful. My first 2 laps I rode quite conservatively, I knew the rocks and heat were going to take a major toll. I also figured flat tires could play a role and since I was unable to get my rear tire to set up tubeless the day before I was racing with a tube and quite worried about it lasting. At the end of my 2nd lap I believe I was down 4-5 minutes on Jeff Winkler. On the 3rd lap I took back a couple of minutes, and caught him half way around the 4th lap. At that point I tried to settle in and keep my eye on the long haul. I never stopped during the race, Amber did a great job of keeping everything ready so I could roll through grab my 2 bottles, sport beans, and pretzels, and keep on. It was tough race, my hands and arms were tired, luckily my legs stayed fairly strong throughout the race. I rolled out of the woods on my 11th lap and heard two minutes to go until 6:00. I did not need to sprint in and go out again so I cruised and finished right a 6:00. Nice day of riding. Thank You to th Heartland Race Crew, Amber, and everyone who came out to make this inaugural event a success

I recently got my SS back from my Uncle who repainted it for me. He built it back in January but I rushed the paint job so I could race it at Old Pueblo and had to have it re-done. It is looking hot now.Jones Bar-Ti Fork-Columbus Frame-White Ind Cranks-Stans Wheels-Toupe Saddle-King Cages

Love it.

locked and loaded

It has been a whirl wind week. The full summer force of bike shop life is well under way. Long days, long rides, lots of lots of stuff. Sometimes I realize just how much therapy bike riding is for me. The last few weeks I have been making it out to Blue River a ton, a number of times I have been out till 1:00 AM pedaling the singlespeed, breaking down the spiders work.

Bike Source is fielding a team for 24 hours of Landahl. I am not gonna beat around the bush, we want to win the overall on fixed gears. Scott Capstack, Craig Stoeltzing, Travis Stephens, and myself. Scott and Craig are golden, I have fitness, Travis can ride a fixed gear like nobodies business. I have fixed gear ride number 2 under me. My 1st ride was a 4 hour effort that left me so sore I could hardly walk for two days. Today was ride 2. Blue River again, two solid hours of riding. I now have a total of six trips across High Line in me, each one I am a little faster, little smoother, learning the tricks. It is fun to be learning something new.

Saturday was my first ever Lenexa Midnight Ride. I had heard the stories and was totally pumped all week. I was having trouble imagining 1000 bike riders taking to the streets, but there they were. We warmed up at Blake's house making sure everyone had the essentials. It was about 4 miles over to the start and I could tell the Electra Townie was a prime choice for the evening. After registration we rendezvoused at Jerry's Bait Shop and jammed to some band called Soul Bandit. They were throwing down pretty hard on the saxophone. Ben Fishman and I made up Team Townie (he had purchased the matching red three speed to mine earlier in the day) We made like Soul Bandits and skipped ahead of some 600 people to get up to the end of the first wave of riders to be released. It reminded me of being the noisy kid at the back of class as we kept the riders entertained waiting for midnight. Fishman and I took off right from the start. It took us about 5 miles but at the turnaround we had passed the 200 riders in front of us and were sitting 3rd and 4th. I was talking so much crap to all the guys on road bikes, it was hilarious. We hauled down into the tunnels and caught the next 2 people. As well Bob Gregor came from behind and was rallying with us. It was a tough dig up the hill out of the tunnels. The foot forward technology of the townie does not lend itself well to climbing out of the saddle. I was now drilling it across the flats on Bob's wheel. I was drafting going 24 MPH. I had to be careful with the raked out front end to keep my distance back. We were insight on the finish line when disaster struck. The engineers at Electra had not tested for high speed sprint launches to the finish line. I dropped my chain, feet went sprawling off the pedals, I was bouncing along, feet trying to run, trying to keep my private part damage to a minimum. I was braced to hit the ground but it never came, I rode it out on my top tube. I put my chain back on and rode gingerly across the finish line with everyone who had witnessed it ecstatic about the whole incident. Ben and I rejoined Soul Bandit for the final few songs and headed out into the night. All in all the Lenexa Midnight Ride is pretty much the greatest thing ever.

Soggy Bottom

Mark Cole, Graham, and I took the long way to the tuesday nighter and rode through some refreshing rain showers. There is nothing better than being on your bike soaking wet and not giving a rip.

Shadd was on his rain bike, didn't get the chance to ask if it was to preserve the drivetrain or not wreck the race rig. Another thing that nothing is better than is people making the conscious decision, "I could hit the ground, better take this bike."

A small field was out, but I tried to keep it entertaining with a barrage of attacks. All of which got nowhere.

I attacked at the top of the hill with three to go. Got a little gap and held on for two laps. As the field caught me my lone teammate Dean Parker gave me a push in the back so I immediately tried again. Thanks DeanO.

Amber made it home from a week in Newport Beach, California. Good to have her home, and thanks for coming out and taking pictures.

Like Mike

I was as shocked as everyone else in the MTB community when I got the news this past fall Mike Janelle had passed away in his sleep. I consider myself very fortunate to have been able to spend some time hanging out with Mike and racing against him. He was the real deal in every way. Visit the website his friends created for him and make a donation if you can. http://www.livelikemike.org