Eugene

Well, it's that time of year again for my most favorite stage race: the Eugene Celebration!  This year in revolving chairs lodging arrangements, I scored a ride and stay with Alex Yale and Kyle Brown of Theraputic Associates.



We totally coulda fit another person or two in the ride.

McBeth

Yeah, same hillclimb, about the same time for me as last year.  So moving onwards, let me show you this awesome queen-szie inflatable mattress that Alex let me use:



The bed was a key component of my success the following few races.  I put my legs up on the headrest as I slept.  It was quite comfortable.

Briggs Hill

Well, going in I knew that this race was going to be quite crazy since it seemed like half of the field was known for attempting and succeeding in breakaways.  Also, there weren't really any teams there, so it was basically every man for himself.

About a mile into the race Dillon Caldwell, Ben Thompson and another dude got the gap.  Well, I knew that with the small field and combo of riders up there, it would be dangerous, but not many people seemed interested in actually cooperating to bring it back despite me trying to get people to do so.  We went up Briggs hill and it seemed like we were trying to get a Strava KOM until it was apparent the field was back together after the turn onto Spencer Creek.

Oh, by the way, at this point, Sam Schartz had been off the front for like half a lap.  The pack stopped doing an organized chase everyone-for-themselves-attempt-to-breakaway and eased up.  However, I was at the back and just kept my race speed wondering if anyone would follow, but nobody did.  And so I bridged up to Sam Schartz.  He then decided to start hammering for me which was fine by me.  Before the next hill we were joined by Paul Bourcier and Kai Applequist and we worked well together.  The next lap a sizeable group including Colby WM, Kyle Medlin and maybe 2-3 others joined us.

At this point, those 3 that had basically gone from the gun had 2:30 on us.  But then our race official car stopped us at the top of Briggs Hill cause an ambulance had blocked the way.  And we learned that those 3 had passed the lead car!  And the refs said they were disqualified and no longer the race leaders.  The rest of the peleton was also stopped at maybe 1:30 behind us.

This changed the dynamic quite a bit and it sure seemed like Colby and Kai who were up in the GC were no longer interested in doing much work.  So after we had climbed Fox Hollow it was grupo compacto except for Paul Bourcier who went just before we were caught.  Bedford guttered us all and asked me who had the gap to which I replied "GASP GASP GASP, paul bourcier, GASP GASP GASP."  And he saw that the entire field was behind him so he didn't feel like going again, I guess.  After a little bit of people waiting for someone to do something I put in my final getaway attempt right before Territorial rd and saw that I was getting away.  I got into TT mode for 30 pedal strokes, set my eyes on Bourcier, then checked behind and saw some attempts to bridge to me.  And then I was in TT mode for 2 minutes, set my eyes on Bourcier who I was catching up to, then checked behind and saw the gap was growing to the field.  And this continued up Briggs hill where I caught Bourcier at the top.

We then drilled it very cooperatively all the way until Bourcier gave me the flick with 300m at which point I unleashed the stompie.  I had to give it one final push at 50m to win by half a wheel.  It was a good win, but I was most pleased that I had gotten away from the coulda-woulda-shoulda group.  In fact Paul and I had gotten away to the tune of 2:30!  And that put me in the lead by 3 seconds.

Then Alex and I went out for Thai and I stopped at Laughing Planet for another burrito.

Coburg TT

I was pretty happy about my TT.  It was crappy weather, but I was able to put in a great time and lost only 9 seconds to Paul Bourcier (Paul has beat me in every TT at the stage races this year).  Also, Colby and English didn't gain anywhere close enough time to get back on GC.  Oh, and I got to ride my awesome TT Bike.

Crit

Well, it was just flat and stuff.  Oh and it started raining at the start so it was slick.  Sam Schartz had exploded yesterday, so he was down on GC and nobody seemed interested in chasing him when he went.  But somehow Kaler Marshall also snuck away and both of them lapped us all!  The rest of the race was or really all of it was Paul and I mostly defending GC and everyone else attacking.  I also did a few attacks but when it became clear that Carl Hoefer was gonna take those remaining 4 bonus seconds for third, I settled for a pack finish and prayed that Kaler Marshall hadn't hoped up too high in GC.





Turned out Kaler jumped from 5th to 3rd with me grabbing 2nd GC and Paul Bourcier finally winning his first Eugene Celebration Stage Race in the p1/2s after 80 attempts.

I had it in me

That was a fun fun fun weekend.

Saturday:

I took the MAX out to Hillsboro and attempted to partly crash the Oregon Cycling Challenge, which had a ride of 400 miles that if finished qualified the cyclist for Race Across America.  But I was out to crash the 60 mile ride which just went up Bald Peak and then back via Spring Hill.  I rode for a little bit with some riders who were actually able to do a good pace up the hill, but then I did 15 minute z3 interval and was gone. I then did a z4 up Bell Rd and then took a wrong turn a few times, tried to draft this group of Porsches out for a day drive and then finally found Scholls Ferry and rode back.  I would've taken some pics, but I no longer have a memory card in my phone and there is some melted remnants of a power bar on the camera glass anyways.

Banana Belt 2:

I had to convince Klipper to commit to giving me a ride despite the forecast suggesting the small possibility of rain.  He came over nonetheless and we drove over arguing discussing about whether one should use the directions a promoter gives you to get to a race or just put in an address into the nearest navigation-enabled device you have.

I didn't quite know how I would feel in the race, seems like the Oregon races are hard to read sometimes, but I wouldn't try breaks too early and try to have good positioning for hills.  I guess I tried a lot of breakaways, but mainly after lap 3.  There were a few good ones including one where it was Zach Winter (he's now on Planet X) and myself.  My rear derailleur was skipping all over the place in the critical range that was needed for the hill sprint, so I was sort of resigned to a so-so finish, but decided to stick it out. 

On the final lap there was a fair amount of action on the backstretch and there was a 2-man break of Rapha and HPC up the road.  It seemed like Bedford was covering a lot of stuff at the front and that a lot of people were tired, so on the last riser before the long flat I decided it would be best to try to be in a break so I'd get last in the break due to the failing derailleur.  I attacked and the derailleur skipped two or three times until I could finally mash without issue and then I was off.  I almost didn't catch the break on the last big hill, but convinced myself to dig deep and finally caught them.

There was a fair amount of cat and mouse going on with the HPC guy who at the time I thought was Trevor Spahr trying to drop us more than a couple times, but I could always catch up.  HPC tried once more to drop us about 200 meters before the wall, but I chased it down and then waited.  Rapha guy took off close to the bottom and I waited while we took the right hand side up the hill.  Right after the worst of the pavement, HPC sort of jumped, but I really kicked it up and passed HPC quickly... and then I passed Rapha... and then I had to shift down for the finish... and with a stroke of very good luck I shifted and the rear derailleur skipped into the perfect gear for the finish... but then I heard a guy coming up hard on the left... and I heard a woman yelling "C'MON STEVEN!!!"... but the gear I was going in was solid... I mashed it through the line before any other wheel and threw my fist in the air with a big smile.

Tour of Walla Walla 2012

I had a really fun weekend. Things really came together in all areas. I got a lot of thoughts, so let me try to go through them chronologically.

The weekend before.

I went out to King's Valley and got a flat on the first lap and had wheel change issues and dnf'ed. It sucked and it was hard to even force myself to do a second lap. The next day I went for a long ride out as far up Larch Mountain road I could with some new biking friends. That was a lot of fun and a nice day.

Things start clicking... literally

On Monday I went to a shop to have them glue on a new tire. While there I also was planning on putting on some new speedplay cleats - a task that was long overdue since I had not done any maintenance whatsoever to the cleats since I first bought the system in July of 2010. They were so bad that the screws attaching the cleat apparatus to the cleat mount were totally stuck if not fused together in a huge pile of rust. Luckily, a shop mechanic was able to drill out the cleat screws and then hacksaw off the apparatus.

Once the new cleats were on (and I had inserted the cleat anglers the right direction) my bike felt like a totally new bike. It was responding with seemingly no loss of power transfer to my every stroke. That night on some hillclimb intervals I easily got the farthest up the hill than ever before. Then at PIR, it felt easy to hang with the pack and even get onto Beardsley's or Ginsberg's wheel in a sprint. However, the wet track and my still slippery tires made things seem a little to sketchy to want to risk sprinting. At least a teammate got in a break so the team got 4th.

And now for the main event

The first stage race of the year for me! There really has not been a stage race that I've been to where it wasn't awesome and this one has been the most awesome yet. I feel like the Tour of Walla Walla is a really challenging regional stage race where doing well means far more than doing well in a local race or even a smaller stakes stage race.

Logistics

Getting there was definitely a battle and I was set on not camping this year. It was also tough to even find a ride out there again, but things worked out. Ted from Audi hooked me up with some other Spokanites (Spokanistanis?) that were renting out a house for the weekend. I slept on the couch the first night and managed to negotiate half of a bed the following evening just like last year. On a sad note, my housemate has been in India for a family emergency, but was gracious enough to loan me his car for the weekend. And off I went!

Friday

This year I have been trying to be a little smarter in choosing where I make my efforts. That means that I did not bury myself trying to breakaway on the first lap. I saved most of my efforts for the hill. The first time up was moderate and I was a wheel-length out of contention for a mountain prime, that was pretty cool though. After that, nobody wanted or could breakaway so I just waited up at the front for the hill again. It came and the pace got harder. Attacks came at 5k to go, but then the winner went at 3k and stayed away by 10 seconds. I came in 9th which I was quite satisfied with. And my mom had some homemade applesauce for me at the finish! Nice.

Saturday

It would seem as if I need to take on some better strategies for criterium riding. Namely not hammering on the front for 75% of the race. After the final prime I actually got away from the field, but then Team Bonehead Cycling sent a guy up to me who then proceeded to attack me and didn't get that far away. Ultimately the peleton caught us after a valiant imbecile pull from another Team Bonehead Cycling guy. I was amazed and then nervously pedaled on the back of the pack in anticipation of a crash that never materialized. Nice.

I took things to another level in the Time Trial. Compared to last year, there now wasn't any wind, I had carbon wheelz and I had a skinsuit. But moreover I again set speed targets for each section of the road. On the first section I didn't anticipate the very slight wind so was a little slower than I wanted to go, but then I crushed it over my target up the hill. On the long downhill I wasn't going as fast as I wanted, but I was still flying. Then I didn't really have a good sense of how far that last stretch was and probably could've pushed it harder. I passed one guy and only got passed by the TT winner which is fine by me, especially since it was Tim. He's all right. My time was 21:16 compared to 24:37 last year. I am pretty stoked about that improvement.

Sunday

Sunday was my day. This time all things came together in the Success Equation, but more importantly I added a dynamic element to the equation in that I adapted my strategy as the race played out. I was sitting 9th in GC, so I was going to breakaway, no question. Last year I attempted to breakaway on the long downhill backstretch on the first lap and then barely had enough energy to stay with the pack after getting caught. This year I was going to go either on the hill after the sharp left or the feedzone hill.

The race day weather was predicted to be 80 degrees with very little wind. So I took 3 water bottles with me. Just before the race I had to swap rear wheels after I had had enough with this valve extender that could not accept air. Right before the start I took a leak (in a port-o-potty) which was a good sign that I was staying hydrated.

As the race began nothing much was happening, except Audi was absolutely intent on getting a break going. They had a guy get away with some other people by the time we got to the backstretch. I was waiting for the GC guys and their teams to do the work to bring it back. Tim (2nd in GC), his teammate and #1 GC put in their time at the front. Eventually we caught them just before the long hill on the front stretch after the break just died completely perhaps due to someone getting a flat, not quite sure.

Now it was time for some counter-attacks. Another Audi guy went up the road along with 2 others. Then a pro-city rider (they had 2 guys in top 10 GC) started mashing his pedals like no other to bridge up. I decided I may as well jump on this free ride and see what happens. It was a little early and not according to my plan, but the effort to stay on that wheel didn't require a lot of exertion for me, so I gave it a shot. We got up to the break quite easily and then were joined by an HSP rider (also 2 of them in top 10 GC). The Audi guy and the Pro City guy fell off, but we still had a yellow jerseyed (not GC-leader yellow) Canadian who claimed he was about to explode due to lack of water.

And so it was 3 of us and we began working. Each of us seemed to be putting in our fair share of effort even despite me taking a break here and there at the back to eat some food. We motored down the long downhill backstretch and then tempo'ed up the feed zone hill. All of us grabbed a watter bottle, but then hammered it down that hill so hard that we almost ran into the lead car if it weren't for us yelling at it. Then up the final hill and we still had our gap. It was then an intense mental and physical battle for us all the way down the hill to the finish. We could see the peleton just dangling about 20-15 seconds behind us most of our descent. After each pull we would nervously look over our shoulder but still kept working. All in all we were quite lucky that the field didn't organize themselves.

We got to the 1k mark and this little 3-man break that could had the podium sealed. After having downed my remaining half a energy bar at 1.5k I was ready for the sprint. We knew yellow jersey wouldn't contest so HSP sat on his wheel and I on his. With 180 to go HSP made a slight move to the right and then I blasted off to the left and pounded it out. At first I was like, is this happening? Am I about to win? Did HSP somehow cross before me? Whoa, I crossed the line! I think I won! I WON!!! YEAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!! YEAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!! I actually screamed "YEEEAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" twice. First time as I pumped my left hand in the air. And the second time while pumping the right hand. YYYEEEAAHHHHHH!!! I just screamed that again in my apartment as I'm righting this, but not too loud, don't want to wake the neighbors. That was an amazing win for me and ranks up there as one of the hardest won and deserved wins given the challenge of the reputable Tour of Walla Walla. I have been so psyched and pumped since this win.

Me and Team Guinness really want to obtain a picture of me winning this stage. Please let me know if you or anyone you know has a picture. I am going to put it here in this blog.

The Success Equation

The problem with bike racing and every other competition for a scarce resource in this world is that not everybody can get that scarce resource. However, sometimes it seems like some people have a seemingly natural and unexplainable ability to excel in the area where they can easily obtain something where others struggle desperately to no avail. However, it is no coincidence that some people are just better at some things than others are.

This entire world is discrete. There are a certain number of people in this world, there is even a certain number of matter in this world, the point is that nothing is infinite in this natural world. And furthermore, rules hold together this world: gravity keeps matter close together, thermodynamics cause weather. And even furthermore there are patterns to everything: certain ways to race a bicycle race that gives you a good chance of winning and certain things to say to women to make them attracted to you.

On a spiritual note, however, my Lord Jesus Christ is infinite and has the power to accomplish anything despite the laws and general patterns of the world since He created all that. But on the other hand, His way of doing things can dramatically differ from what any one person can judge to be good, bad, preferred or even desired. So even though it can be possible for a paralyzed man to desire to win the Tour de France, this man is subject to the conditions placed on him by God.

No matter how strong of a bike rider you are, since you probably don't have such a superior amount of fitness that you can ride away from everyone since you are constrained to the general abilities of the human body, there has to be some management of the exertion of the potential energy you have. Similarly, with women (the other obnoxious area of my life where it seems like it's impossible to achieve success) since I am constrained by the amount of base attractiveness I have relative to every other douchebag competing for the same woman, there has to be some difference in my methodology for achieving my goal. So, I have come up with an equation to describe this problem:

Success

This is the end result that you want. In a bike race, usually the result you want is to be the first across the line. With women, I want to have consistent companionship with a woman that loves me how I like to be loved and enjoys receiving my love as well. So, how to get these things?

Situational Awareness

Do you really understand what is going on around you? In a bike race, do you know how many miles are left in the race? How to tell who is feeling strong? Or how good you are feeling? The world around us feeds us data about the current state of everything. But how good are you at determining exactly what the world is telling you? When this bonehead Evan from Guinness makes an attack 5 miles into a 70 mile race, how likely is it that he will ride faster than the other 50 riders for the next 65 miles? In the sprint, who is the sprinter that knows what wheel to take and where should you position yourself prior to those last 3 turns?

With women it is just as complex, but my awareness is so bad that I can barely guess what is happening. And at times I have let my feelings rage out of control to the point where I'm so excited about a woman that I can't see that she's actually not as good as I think she is. The point is that each situation has particles of information located all over the place and the more of this information that the brain can process and catalog, the more informed one will be when the time comes to make a decision about what action to take.

Strategy Formulation

So, how to achieve your goal? To win a bike race you have to ride hard and fast, right? To get a girl you have to "be yourself", right? Unfortunately for things that are hard to get, it is usually not simple. In fact it is annoying and painful and at times compelling to make one try harder.

If you ever fail in succeeding, you probably did something wrong. Perhaps that breakaway attempt at mile 5 of a 70 mile race was not a good idea. Maybe I shouldn't have been so nice to that woman that wasn't all that interesting. To achieve your goal there are patterns that can be more effective for certain kinds of situations. To win from a bike race, your timing must be just right to be first across the line. To get into a loving relationship, both parties must be interested in and working towards the benefit of each other.

The challenge is in the details of how to achieve your goal. And typically and even statistically if you really want to study it, there are patterns that generally can be followed to obtain a certain result. There are patterns that rarely work such as breaking away 5 miles into a 70 mile race or being the most boring person on earth to a woman, but then others patterns that are usually more successful like being behind a good wheel up until the last point of a field sprint or with women... actually I don't have much advice to offer with that. But the more ways one can identify to achieve their goal the more arsenal one will have in trying to achieve their goal.

Execution

With whatever strategy you use, there is the slight matter of actually carrying it out. You can be in exactly the right spot at the right time and still execute poorly and thus not achieve the level of success you wanted. For example, at last year's Franz Bakery Crit I had planned on sprinting for the win, but pedaled through the final corner crashing myself and then the field passed me, however at the Salem Crit I sprinted for the win on a 500m straightaway.

Luck

Luck can be anywhere in the spectrum between good and bad. If you had no idea what was going on around you and you didn't really have a plan, but the result of whatever you executed was success, than you had good luck. If you did not achieve your desired result despite thinking you were aware of your situation and came up with and executed what you thought was the best possible strategy, then you had bad luck. Luck is an interesting factor because it basically represents a situation you were not aware of or some strategy you weren't realizing that you were doing. If everything about the world is known and all possible strategies and their outcomes are already known then luck is a passive variable in the equation.

Bad luck for example can range from being struck by lightning to getting a flat tire. Yet since the world is discrete these items are not random. There are patterns to lightning and you're much more likely to be struck by it if you bike around holding a 40 foot metal pole sticking into the air in a thunderstorm in Florida. But even with the flat tire, the chances are far less likely that you'll get a flat tire if you slap on a brand new tire in substitute for the tire you've been riding since last season. Luck is an opportunity to learn more about the world and various situations and what strategies you can design to combat such a problem in the future or if whatever caused the good luck is replicable, perhaps this can be used again to achieve success again.

Resources

No matter how well you sense things, pick good plans and execute them well, you are bound by the physical resources at your disposal that you will need to accomplish the goal. If you want to win a bike race, you will need to have a bike. If you want to win a time trial against Fabian Cancellara you better have an immense amount of fitness available to use. In the case of the paralyzed man who wants to win the Tour de France, while he himself may not be physically capable of doing it himself, there would be nothing stopping him from giving other resources of his own to another person who has a body functioning well enough that he could accomplish that success.

Putting it all together

Success is tough because it requires a keen situational awareness combined with an effective strategy and then decent enough execution of that strategy or strategies all assuming you have enough resources available to achieve your goal. I've personally got a lot to work on in both the situational awareness and strategy formulation departments. With biking I need to be aware of the course and competitors and how much effort I am able to exert over the remaining distance. With women, I've got to be able to sense what they are feeling like and if I'm being treated well enough by them. And then I've got to have a whole range of tactics to employ in my bike racing from attacking at certain times or even having teammates do work for me. With women, it's really weird how they react to certain strategies and it can often times be surprising what strategies are effective.

Anyways, Racing...

I didn't do Hagg Lake because I got really sick the night before due to what I believe to have been a rotten tomato. So, this weekend it's up to Washington for Sequim and Mason Lake.