The Endeavors of Payson McElveen

New Website!

2011-03-28T08:56:00.000-07:00

As I've been alluding to for a while now, something new has been in the works. Today I can finally unveil my new website, paysonmcelveen.com!

This Blogspot has served me well over the past 2 years, and I hope been useful and enjoyable for y'all. As I progress in the sport, all of the different components must also, from equipment to training to general professionalism. This new website is the next step in that process.

Feel free to explore the new site, and then go on over to the "Blog" tab to get some more details!

Note: Keep in mind that while nearly all the content is complete, there are a couple last bits that will be added in the coming days.

www.paysonmcelveen.com

In the Pain Business

2011-03-24T06:22:00.000-07:00

Bike racing is inherently difficult. Pain and suffering is fundamental to the sport. Many outside it simply do not understand the draw: I heard one classmate, a basketball player, characterize what I do each day after school as no more than what he and the team do at the end of basketball practice for punishment: "Suicides"- basically intervals running up and down the basketball court until exhausted. He simply wasn't able to understand how doing "Suicides" for two hours each day instead of practice would be any fun. My classmates do occasionally like to poke fun at my pursuit, calling me "The Masochist." Sometimes to mess with me they introduce me to someone: "This is Payson... he loves pain."

Saying I love pain is not quite true. In reality, I think it may be one of the most profound "Love/Hate" relationships I know. I find few things in life as fulfilling as exploring my own physical and mental limits. It is the single thing that makes me feel the most "alive". And in this game, pain = speed.

However, the relationship between pain and success in this sport can be soul-crushing. In most cases, the person that trains the hardest usually wins. And this is why most afternoons after school or work, while others drive home to eat and watch T.V., some of us go out and inflict pain on ourselves... a lot of it. Of course, to many jokesters in my class, this obviously means I "like" pain. But in fact, at times I'm quite scared of it. Each night I review my workout for the following day, and some nights I have literally lain awake dreading the next day's ride.

Strangely, not only do I look forward to doing this sport for the rest of my life, I am trying very hard to make it become my profession. A fellow racing friend and I once commented to each other during a conversation regarding how torturous training and racing can be: "What a silly way to make a living!"

On Tuesday I had a simple yet very hard workout. Suiting up I felt unemotional, just like I was going out for another day on the job. That mood stayed pretty much the same for the following 2 hrs. as I executed the workout, putting my body on the limit. When I was done my legs were trashed. Unlike many days in the first couple of years when I started training hard, I didn't feel sorry for myself, or question what I was doing. I know what I'm doing, and I know why. Lately I haven't been afraid of the pain, and instead met it with either excitement, or little emotion at all. I hope to soon make this my profession, and I feel a need to begin approaching it as if it were. I'd like to think I'm well on my way.

Race Report: TMBRA #2 STORM Hill Country Challenge- A Hard-Earned Podium

2011-03-18T12:00:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was the TMBRA #2 STORM Hill Country Challenge, held on the fabled and tradition-bound Flat Rock Ranch course in Comfort Texas. In it's eleventh year, "Comfort" is a classic. I have had mixed luck there with a victory or two as well as my best Pro/Cat 1 finish ever in 2nd. However, the past two years, the rocky, epic 27 mile course has gotten the better of me. At the same event last year, my race ended 100 yards from the start line, as another racer had a mechanical difficulty that sent him plowing into my front wheel, completely taco-ing it and ending my race in the first minute. Just a month or two back I experienced 4 hours of this brute of a course, at the aptly named "Miles of DisComfort Marathon."

I had high hopes for my race this past weekend, and while I did come away with a respectable result, I once again had to pay my dues to this classic hill country mountain bike racing track.

In the days leading up to the event I felt pretty good physically, but even better mentally. With three of the states' top racers away at the ProXCT event in California, I saw a great opportunity to win my first ever Pro/Cat 1 race.

Here's a synopsis of how my race played out. You can get another perspective on the weekend from my teammate and friend Mason Shea on his blog.

With the first mile of the race covering a flattish open jeep road, not many wanted to work on the front and push the pace, resulting in one of the tamest cross-country race starts I've ever experienced. Knowing what lay in store in the following hour, I decided to bide my time. Gradually the pace began to pick up as we snaked our way up "Mount Park." To finish the climb, racers had to navigate a tricky, steep ledge combo. In years past this section has been no problem, but with the extremely dry conditions and years of erosion, the area has become much more challenging. Unfortunately I had a lapse in concentration and made a mistake, forcing me to jump off and run up the rest of the way. Once back on the bike, I looked up just in time to see the three leaders (Rick Wetherald, Matt Gordon and Wiley Mosley) riding out of sight.

They had only gained a 15 seconds lead, but it would take me riding a bit into the red zone and pinning the entire rest of the 45 minute loop to finally rejoin them.

I spent 15 or 20 minutes settling back in and regaining my composure. Realizing I still felt pretty strong, I began planning my tactics for the rest of the race. First order of business: move up from last place in the group. If someone were to attack, with another rider in front of me not able to follow, I'd be stuck, possibly missing the decisive moment, not a good situation. With this in mind I pulled a cheeky little move on Wiley while he was getting a drink, to get into the third spot (sorry Wiley!).

Sure enough, not long after that, Matt Gordon surged around Rick and began rapidly opening a lead. After a minute or two we hit an open dirt road section and I was able to pass Rick. It then took a good 5 or more minutes to close the relatively small gap to Matt... I knew then that he was on a strong day; winning the race was going to be very tough.

Soon after making contact again, things settled down. Wiley had stayed on my wheel, while Rick trailed a handful of seconds in arrears... he seemed to be missing a gear that day. Not wanting him to make contact with us again, I took the lead from Matt and set a steady tempo. I have ridden the Comfort course many times and find that I can gain a considerable amount of time on a couple of the more sustained descents. With that in mind, I pinned two in particular as hard as I could, hoping to gap Wiley and Matt. They didn't budge. Unfortunately, from then on the course was mostly flat, with very little climbing. From Warda two weeks before I'd seen how much stronger Matt was than me on the flats.

As I feared, with around 10 minutes to go in the race Matt surged past me on a smooth flat stretch and put down a very hard attack. I simply could not follow. Wiley, however, seemed content with staying on my wheel.

Matt was soon out of sight, and I knew, save for a mechanical issue or crash, the race for the win was over. I could not, however, wallow in my disappointment, as the race for 2nd was very much on.

With the remaining five minutes of the race mainly downhill, I began taking some risks and descending more aggressively hoping to gap Wiley slightly, or at least keep him from being able to pass. Then, coming into a tight section between two trees just a few minutes from the finish, disaster struck: I managed to clip the end of my handlebar on a tree, and was flung at 20+ mph into a full grown Oak Tree. I lay for a second, knowing I'd broken or dislocated something. Wiley, being the gentleman he is, had stopped to make sure I was okay. This was a bigger deal than it may seem, as Rick had not given up, and was still less then 30 seconds back and chasing hard. I told Wiley to go on. Miraculously I had not broken anything. My right upper back/shoulder had taken all of the impact, guarding my collarbone, front of my shoulder (which would have surely dislocated or separated had I landed on it), and maybe most importantly my bike, from the collision. I thought I could hear Rick coming, which was enough to get me scrambling back on my bike. Seeing Wiley just a few corners ahead, I bore down in a last ditch effort to catch him. It became a drag race to the finish and I didn't make up a single second while chasing. Kudos, sir, it would have been an interesting finish between us!

Finishing on the podium was a good result, but I came away from the race disappointed. I had really, really wanted to win. While I had made a crucial mistake early in the race, truth be told, I had simply been out-ridden by Matt. He was incredibly strong. Congratulations to him!

The crash was one of the most violent ones I can remember taking. It left me with a pulled mystery muscle on my rib-cage right below my armpit, a sizable hematoma on my left quad, and some pretty good road rash, errr, bark rash, where I slammed into the tree.

The rest of the team favored quite well in the Pro/Cat 1 field:
Stew Stafford 7th
Brian Kuehl 9th
Sean Ahmadi 10th
Craig Kunz 11th

In other categories we had many victories and podiums as well, solidifying our lead in the team classification, as the strongest team in the state. Woo hoo!

Tomorrow my dad and I leave for Glen Rose, TX, for round #3 of the TMBRA series: The Cat Claw Challenge on Solavaca Ranch.

I know race reports can get old, so look for the next posts to have a new slant to them, focused more on some of the quirks and intricacies of my day to day life that are centered around becoming a better bike racer. Also, look for the unveiling of an exciting new project VERY soon... yes, the one I've been promising for some time now that will replace this blogspot!

Race Report: Lago Vista- A Breakthrough

2011-03-10T10:29:00.000-08:00

At 7:10 AM last Sunday morning I was rudely jolted out of a deep sleep by my alarm clock. I lay in the darkness for a few moments sorting out in my head what was planned for the day. Despite spending all Saturday sleeping in and recuperating, the five day mandatory school class trip of the previous week still had me feeling sluggish and sleepy.

After a few seconds there in the dark and under my warm duvet I suddenly remembered I'd be lining up for a road race in less than 3.5 hours. I didn't feel particularly excited with the realization, and unemotionally sat up and flipped on the light. "Time to go to work," I thought.

A few minutes later I had a few eggs cooking on the stove and began filling bottles, grabbing helmet, shoes and kit.

As I sat at the table, mechanically eating my eggs and toast, doubts began whirling through my head: "What if I just stay home and get caught up on sleep? I am still so far behind. I might just dig myself into a deeper hole of fatigue and stress. Is it really worth driving the 1.5 hrs. to the race? What if I crash? Is this one training race worth risking my entire season?"

My dad walked into the room: "Almost ready to go?" He asked.

I offered a simple: "Yep." Holding back on telling him how I really felt.

Suddenly I realized I was just trying to cut deals with myself. I muttered a simple: "Let's do this," under my breath, gathered my things, threw the road bike in the van, and ran one last mental checklist.

Less than 2 hours later I was on my bike, registered, and warming up on the Lago Vista course I'd heard about for so many years. By the time I'd crested the top of the surprisingly substantial climb, I was in a whole different mindset than I'd been in at the kitchen table earlier that morning. Something about climbing solo, settling into the familiar rhythms of my pedal stroke, heart beat, and breathing cleared my mind. I rolled up to the start line ready to give it my best against the 80+ Cat 3/4 men's field.

The race was my first time in the 3/4s, and my first time in a pack even remotely so big. I knew it would be ever more critical to stay towards the front.

Our race consisted of 9 times around the 5.1ish mile circuit. The course was made up of a substantial, stair-step climb with sections over 10% in the first couple miles, then a fairly flat section on the top, followed by a fast and windy, false flat descent back to the finish. After pre-riding the climb during my warm-up I knew it was a course I could potentially make a move on, as the climb was quite a solid one.

The first 6 or 7 laps passed fairly uneventfully. I floated around in the top third of the pack, making sure to stay out of trouble and trying to conserve my energy. On the 7th time up the climb I noticed a significant difference in the attitude of the riders around me. We'd attack the bottom of the hill at the same clip that we had been, but it seemed as though the peloton was easing up slightly once we crested the top. I also paid close attention to the breathing and posture of the riders around. I could soon tell that many were getting tired.

On the second to last lap I made the decision that I would attack near the top of the climb, on the last lap. Although I knew I'd be able to build a more substantial gap initially if I attacked at the bottom, it was still a long 4 miles to the finish once you crested the top. Not knowing if I'd be able to stay away on my own, I knew attacking near the top would draw out a rider or two that were truly still strong at this point in the race, and would make a good breakaway partner.

So, near the top of the climb on the final lap I finally got a chance to do what I've dreamed of doing since I was a 7 year old boy watching the Tour de France: Stood on the pedals and launched out into the void. The feeling is indescribable.

Tactically, things could not have turned out more beautifully. After a few seconds I looked back to see what kind of gap was developing. To my delight, friend and fellow Pro/Cat 1 mountain bike racer Jorge Muñoz was bridging the gap. The situation was developing exactly the way I'd hoped. I eased off the pedals until he made contact, and then it was off to the races.

We worked well together and soon were out of site of the field. We hammered, I think taking fairly even pulls, both riding at the limit knowing that the opportunity was there to make something pretty special work.

When we were at the one kilometer to go sign, with still no sign of the bunch, we knew we'd done it. With 200 meters to go I sprinted with all I had left... and crossed the line arms raised. Finally, I'd won a road race. The emotions I felt in that moment could not have been more different than those at 7:10 AM that morning...

All in all the day was a huge boost of confidence. Not only had I raced well, but that evening after analyzing the power file it was evident that I am in a very good place with my fitness. It's going to be a good year.

I would like to say a huge thank you to Jorge for making the breakaway work. We'll get to face each other again tomorrow at the TMBRA #2 at Comfort.

Honey Stinger

2011-03-07T14:58:00.000-08:00

I'm very excited to announce my new partnership with Honey Stinger! Based out of Steamboat Springs, Colorado, Honey Stinger is a nutrition company with products aimed at supporting an active, healthy lifestyle. The company was founded in 2002 by a honey industry veteran, athletic entrepreneur, a food product developer and a beekeeper. Many of their products are 100% USDA certified Organic, and all are naturally sweetened with honey.

I was first introduced to the company when a friend offered me one of their "Gold" Energy Gels during a long mountain bike ride. I knew next to nothing about the company at the time, but loved the taste of the gel and immediately did some research when I got home. I was even more intrigued by the company when I learned that the product was not only friendly to my taste buds, but extremely healthy as well. In Honey Stinger I found a company making products that will keep me fueled to go the distance, and do so healthfully.

They have an awesome line of products that give you multiple ways to stay fueled during race, ride or at any time in the day. As their packaging reads: "run, ski, wrestle, fish, bull ride, climb, lift, surf, split wood, ride, sting." During a typical 1.5- 2 hour cross-country mountain bike race, I prefer to eat one gel a few minutes before the start, and then 2 or 3 during the race. My favorite flavors include "Gold" (85% honey), strawberry and chocolate. Other flavors include Banana and "Ginsting" if you need an extra boost. After the race I begin my recovery process with a Protein Bar.

For longer distance races such as Marathons or road races, just downing Gels can get old. In order to keep energy systems high, an Energy Bar does wonders. Also critical to performance is keeping your electrolyte stores well supplied. I am pretty sure there is no tastier way to do so than these organic energy chews. The Orange Blossom flavor is to die for!

Lately the talk of the industry is the new organic Honey Stinger Waffles. Yes, waffles. The idea behind these sinfully good creations came from the man himself, Lance Armstrong.

"Our partner Lance Armstrong gave us the inspiration for the Stinger Waffle direct from his years racing and training in Europe. 'One of my favorite things to eat on the bike is the 'stroopwafel' found in northern Europe. I hope you'll like this organic Honey Stinger version. Enjoy!'"

These fit perfectly in a jersey pocket and are like heaven-on-earth during a long training ride.

Here is a very recent example of how Honey Stinger has helped me succeed: Just yesterday I participated in the Lago Vista road race. Over the 2 hour, 50 mile race I consumed 2 Gels and one Peanut Butter n' Honey Energy Bar. On the 9th and final lap, I attacked near the top of the largest climb on the course, successfully breaking away with another rider. In the finale I out sprinted him to take the win!

I'm psyched to be a part of this company I love, and hope you'll give their stuff a try! I know you won't be disappointed.

Race Report: TMBRA #1 Warda

2011-03-05T12:54:00.000-08:00

Last Sunday, February 27th, marked the start of the 2011 racing season. While I've done some racing earlier this year, I had treated those more as "pre-season" and tune up races. After last weekend, this show is finally on the (0ff)road!

Happening in late February, the Warda race is still in the very, very early season. It can be both a blessing and a curse that the Texas racing calendar starts so early: It gives an opportunity to get in some hard fitness-building races when most other parts of the world are still snowed in. However taking too much advantage of the warm weather by racing and training a large amount too soon can leave one tired and burnt out come the important races in July and August. This year those include races like the Wisconsin ProXCT, the Mont Saint Anne and Windham World Cups, National Championships and hopefully World Championships, which all happen in late June and run through early September. As my race schedule has become more and more dependent on that of the ProXCTs and World Cups, planning the season has become increasingly tricky. I have a real desire to do well in the Texas races, as that is where I compete with my closest friends and in front of my team sponsors, but always have to remind myself of the big picture, and the races still four, five and six months away. Simply swallowing my pride and giving it my best when I'm not quite yet at my best can be challenging.

So, as the 30 of us lined up, I was distinctly less nervous than I have been in years gone by, as I know what lies ahead in the coming months. At the same time, however, I can't deny that the desire to come out on top in some of my old friendly rivalries was still there.

The race started about as expected and in the spirit of how the first race of the season should: Fast, aggressive and nervous. The field was one of the biggest (30) and most stacked (all the big players showed up) we'd seen in a while. As we made quick work of the 1 mile, flat jeep road start loop, there was enough leaning, elbowing and wheel rubbing to make any seasoned racer nervous. As we entered the singletrack, one individual who shall remain nameless, had me elbow checked, and was running me straight towards a 2 foot thick pine tree. Had I not given in and slammed on the brakes at the last second my race report may have ended right here.

The race lap was almost identical to years past: A 15ish minute very twisty, flat and tight "cornerer's delight" section at the beginning, followed by a long flat drag across the meadow, then a very fun 10ish minute hillier section that could be characterized as a "Europe Jr." To finish off the lap there was another mostly flat jeep road section to the start/finish.

As we entered the singletrack for the first time, Tristan Uhl was setting an incredibly fast tempo at the front of the race and the field was soon strung out. While I felt like I was riding completely on my limit in this twisty section, once we got into the lower hilly part, I was able to move up more easily. By the end of the first lap I'd moved up to 8th place.

The remainder of the race went fairly uneventfully. I rode lap 2 hanging onto Matt Gordon and Jorge Muños' wheel, but let them go with a lap and a half to go in the race. Again I found that while in the flat twisties I was on my limit but not over it, but simply couldn't match the power of the others on the flat, straight open sections. Once into the "Mini-Europe" part of the course, I felt much more at ease and nearly like we were soft-pedaling up some of the climbs.

On the fourth lap I managed to catch one other rider, and came within just a few seconds of re-catching Matt Gordon. That slotted me into 7th place.

I didn't cross the line smiling, as I was disappointed with the result. The year before I'd finished one place better in 6th, although it was in a much more watered down field. My goal in the Texas pro races is always to finish on the podium, so a 7th place was obviously not the result I was looking for. However, there were definitely some good signs big-picture wise: I beat my time from last year by over 30 seconds. Not only that, the 1 mile start loop was not included in the previous year's edition, meaning I finished closer to 3 minutes ahead of my time... a significant improvement.

Our team did well, with numerous victories and podiums in other categories. In the Pro/Cat 1s we placed 3 in the top 10, and 5 in the top 20. Kevin Fish put in an awesome performance to start his first year as a licensed Pro, as he rode in the lead group with Tristan Uhl and Bryan Fawley for the entire race. Unfortunately a dropped chain at a seriously inopportune moment cost him a shot at victory.

All in all it was a satisfactory start to the season. There is no hiding the fact that I have some work to do still, but then again, I've got some time...

Team Bicycle Sport Shop Kits 2011

2011-02-25T18:59:00.001-08:00

A few weeks ago when I introduced my new race bike, I talked a little bit about the equipment and technology of the sport. Although all the gadgetry involved can make things very expensive very quickly, it's also one of the things that defines the sport and makes it so beautiful. It can also serve as an incredible source of motivation. Whether it's a new race bike or a new pair of sunglasses, "freshness" always seems to add a bit of excitement.

Yesterday, freshness came in the form of our 2011 Team Bicycle Sport Shop kits. Take a look:

A stylish variation on last years very successful design. This year with a bigger BSS logo, team sponsors, and some flashy white, red and grey highlights.

The bib shorts this year get lots more white, which I think looks sweet.

Look for these kits to be dominating podiums in locations near you throughout 2011!

Valley of the Sun Stage Race

2011-02-19T11:11:00.000-08:00

Last Wednesday started like most week days do for me: Wake up at 7:00 AM, get school stuff together, quickly make a lunch, jump in the car and turn East on 290 to make the quick 5 minute drive to school. However, this day was different. Mid morning a very strange orange and blue cavalcade pulled up the driveway, picked up me, my bikes and couple bags, and turned West on 290 towards... Arizona?

A couple weeks earlier I'd decided to accept an invitation to race as a "guest rider," with the Chipotle Junior Development Team. We would be doing the Valley of the Sun stage race in Pheonix, AZ. I was very excited with the prospect of getting to race my first big national level road race... and with the best junior development team in the country. However, in the lead-up to the trip it wasn't all fun and games:

I continued to struggle to get over my bronchitis infection (I still have a faint rattle deep in my chest each time I take a deep breath), and although we'd decided I was ready to work hard again, the idea that my body wasn't fully back to health was a constant damper on mood and motivation. Also, due to the nature of my high school, going on this trip was going to require some seriously intense homework in the days leading up to my departure. I had to finish all assignments normally due by the end of the week, by Tuesday. 2 days to do a weeks' worth of homework. That had me up until 1 a.m. three days in a row.

So, on Wednesday morning, I climbed in the orange and blue Garmin-Transitions van and we were off. Other team members making the drive from Texas were Danny Parks, Imari Miller, Noah Williams, and Oklahoman Grahmm Smith.

Despite an incredibly unlucky streak of 3 straight "out of order" gas station bathrooms, the drive went fairly smoothly, and roughly 19 hours later we rolled into Phoenix. Although the van was nice and spacious, I'd gotten hardly any sleep. Even in my groggy, sleep-deprived state, I got that excited jittery feeling from being in a place I'd never been, as I peaked out the window at a 4 AM Arizona desert. We collapsed in the rented house, (we wouldn't realized what a place we had until the morning), and slept until 10 am.

The next day, Thursday, was filled with preparation for the coming race. Throughout the day other team members arrived in twos and threes from the airport. Between building bikes and setting up equipment, we "rested" in the Man Cave. The Man Cave was basically just the downstairs area where all the team members slept. It had a ridiculous sound system (just ask Chloe and Christian), numerous armchairs and couches, and... the focus of it all, something like a 12 foot x 8 foot home theatre. We watched WAY too many movies. Oh, we had a pool and hot tub at our disposal as well.

After 5 or 6 more team members had arrived and built their bikes we headed out to loosen up the legs a bit. It turned out to be one of the sketchiest rides of my life. It only lasted an hour but all of us had at least one close call or sketchy moment. The roads were bad, there was lots of traffic and tons of intersections. We were all happy when it was over with.

Spinning out the legs after the long drive. Pic taken by Coach Christian from the team van. So pro.

The race consisted of three stages. A Time Trial, Road Race, and Criterium.

Time Trial:

The Time Trial for me was disastrous. There're probably a thousand reasons it may have gone so poorly, but I think mostly it came down to my complete lack of experience. I started in a hole to begin with, as I was the only one in the race without a proper time trial bike... a serious disadvantage in a race against the clock this long. We calculated that just a rear disc wheel alone would shave over 47 seconds. The day before we'd patched together what we could in terms of equipment: Slapped on some clip-on TT bars and put on a spare Zipp 808 front wheel. I definitely got some looks as I warmed up on my Frankenstein bicycle. Despite my coach warning me about going out too hard, I did just that... way too hard. The result was eight or ten minutes of superman, followed by 25 of a small weak child. I was angry at myself for not having more discipline, and downright embarrassed with my result. I wound up in something like 37th place out of 50, losing me massive amounts of time on GC. The rest of the 17-18s on the team hadn't fared much better with our time trial specialist ending up in 13th, almost three minutes down on the leader. We had our work cut out for us.

The 15-16s on the other hand cleaned up, I believe placing 4 in the top 5!

That evening at dinner I was pretty downtrodden. The unbelievably good food made by Chloe did manage to cheer me up a bit. That night we prepared our road bikes for the long road race the next day. For me that simply entailed taking off the clip on aero bars and putting on a second bottle cage.

That night falling asleep my mind did what my body hadn't managed to do earlier in the day... race. Despite my best efforts I kept going back to how awfully the time trial had gone for me. Slowly I started to gain perspective and remembered that I wasn't here for me, I was here for the team. Tomorrow was a new day, and all I could do was ride hard. While I hoped I'd remember the valuable lessons I'd learned from the time trial, I wished I could forget the rest of it quickly!

Road Race:

The next morning we got up and were treated, as was the trend for the entire stay, to Chloe's amazing cooking. By late morning we were at the race venue and busied ourselves with last minute preparation. At the same time, the 15-16s arrived from their race which had finished minutes before. It was interesting to see the excitement and expectation of us 17-18s not yet having raced, versus the exhausted and broken 15-16 year olds. We got some last second words of advice regarding the course and wind direction from them before heading to the start line.

In the first hour of the race I found myself in a the same situation I always have in these things: Floating around the pack without much control of my positioning. I realized being at the right place at the right time was just going to be pure luck. I think we did a good job of playing our role as the strongest and most dominant team in the peloton. Despite having a teammate in the long breakaway, we continued to throw down surges to try and shell the main group in the cross winds. It worked to some degree, but the peloton remained mostly together as we came through to start our final lap. With eight or so miles to go, I suddenly heard: "Payson, get the f*ck up here now!" It was my teammate Chandler. I looked up and saw a group of about 15 rolling off the front very quickly. I hastily forced my way up. Chandler quickly relayed that we had to bring that group back. Apparently there were quite a few of the stronger guys in it, and once it was gone, it was gone. What happened next was one of the highlights of the trip for me: Chandler and I took about 3 or 4 super hard 20 or 30 second pulls each, and single handedly brought the group back. I can't explain how cool it felt to work as a team like that, in a pivotal point of the race, and come out on top.

A beautiful day for a ride in the Arizona desert. That's Hugh on the far left getting ready to make things interesting.

The finish line was at the top of the main "climb" (really just a 3 kilometer 2.7% false flat). With 3 kilometers to go I looked back and realized there was no one behind me. I was at the very back of the group... again. I quickly began to pick my way up through the field until I was sitting about 20 riders back. The hill started to pitch up to its maximum gradient of 4%, and I looked up and saw the rider in front of me had fallen off the pace, and a group of 10 or so were riding away. I buried my head and really turned the screws on myself to bridge the gap. From there, I hung on for dear life to the back of the group, thinking at any second I was going to get dropped. Instead, a couple other riders started to fall of the pace. After a very hard drag race to the line, I came across in 6th out of the group, and 8th on the stage (2 had stayed away in the break.) Gregory, our top placed GC guy finished right in front of me in 6th, moving him up to 9th overall, from 13th.

As we cleaned up and hung up our bikes in the trailer my mood had completely changed from the day before. Not only had I gotten a decent result myself, but I'd helped the team. I felt like I was finally getting the real road racing experience.

That night I enjoyed my food much more, and wasn't tormented by self doubts and second thoughts as I fell asleep.

Criterium:

Stage 3 was a criterium in downtown Phoenix. We woke up very early, and after a light breakfast rode the ten miles to the course. The race was set to start at 7:40 AM, but on account of the sun not being up yet, was delayed a few minutes. Ten minutes later and it was announced over the loud speaker that the race would be delayed even longer, as they'd decided it was necessary to put hay bails around the lamp posts and other potential hazards on the course... a good idea. Finally, over an hour later, we lined up.

After how well Chandler and I had worked together the previous day, and seeing as how neither of us were a GC threat, the game plan was for us to take off from the gun, and give the other teams something to chase. With seconds to go, it felt like a mountain bike race as I focussed on the sound of the gun that would set me free.

In the Chipotle kits from left to right: Rhys, Dave Kessler, Greg, me and Hugh. I heard some snickering as I rolled up in my skinsuit. I didn't care. I wanted to take every opportunity I could to wear it before I had to give it back. It felt so fast!

I guess I ended up attacking a bit too hard, as 30 seconds in and I found myself solo off the front. I decided I might as well go ahead with the game plan and see how long I could stay away, taking pressure off the rest of the team. The answer was, "not very long," as I found it was taking 600+ watts to maintain any sort of gap... simply not sustainable. After a lap I was caught, and I settled back into the pack and tried to recover.

Trying to recover from my first lap attack. That's Greg playing it cool behind me.

The rest of the team played out our game plan beautifully, attacking one after another, in a relentless barrage of orange and blue. No one ended up staying off the front for more than two laps, but after the race "Damn Chipotle was strong!" was a common remark.

On the front, trying to make the race hard.

With two laps to go I found myself near the front and decided, knowing as a mountain bike racer that my sprint is a bit of joke, to take another flier. My gap was shut down pretty quickly but I stayed on the front for half a lap or so trying to make things hard and string things out. The finish was fairly anticlimactic , with us all finishing somewhere in the group.

Taking a dig (which basically just turned into a monster pull) with two laps to go.

In the 15-16s race, however, we had more luck. Zack Gould apparently did a perfect lead out for junior superstar Michael Dessau, who managed to cross the line, fists held high. Wooohooo! Great job guys.

By 1:00 PM we were on the road, and 19ish hours later (I slept much better this time around), we pulled into Dripping Springs.

I would like to say a huge "Thank You!" to Christian and Chloe Williams. They work unbelievably hard to make this program work, and do it so well. Also to Noah, Imari, Chandler, Hugh, Rhys, Dave, Jonathan, Michael, Grahmm, Danny, Gregory, Zack and the rest of the Chipotle Junior Development Team for giving me this opportunity. It was fun. I'll see y'all at the races!

False Start

2011-02-08T21:18:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the struggles of being sick. I concluded by saying something to the effect of finally being out of the woodwork and able to get back into the thick of things... apparently I spoke too soon.

Although at that point I'd finally rid myself of the "Niagra Falls nose syndrome" and general crummy feeling, my symptoms had turned into something much more serious: All kinds of junk in my lungs and a wheezy cough... also known as Bronchitis. Whether the Comfort Marathon brought it on, or it would have happened regardless, I was forced to take a whole other week off of training. After having to play all sorts of mind games to get myself through one week of not training, you can imagine what sort of mental state I was in during the throws of my second week off.

FINALLY, as of this past weekend I've been able to get back to doing some real work on the bike... I think this time I really am back to health. And it's just in time:

Tomorrow morning I will be loading up with a handful of other junior bike racers in the Chipotle Junior Development Team van. The team is one of, if not the premier junior development program in the country, and part of the ProTour Garmin/Cervélo family. A couple weeks ago I was asked if I'd be interested in being a "guest rider" on the team... I didn't think twice.

So, early tomorrow we begin a "way-too-many-hour" drive to Scottsdale, Arizona for the Valley of the Sun road race, where we will meet more of the team, haling from Colorado and Virginia, among other states. The trip will present me with many firsts: My first big, national-level road race. It will also be my first multi-day stage race. Thirdly, it will be my first road time trial.

I honestly don't have a clue what to expect. My suspicion is that I will be implemented as a workhorse for some of the more experienced road racers on the team. I do not have any time trial equipment (a real factor as the opening stage time trial is fairly long), so I doubt my goals will be GC (General Classification) based. My game plan is simple: Listen. Learn. And ride as hard as I can. I've got a bit of work to do in order to make up for the past two week's "vacation," and suspect 3 day of hard racing will be a good place to start.

If you would like to stay up to date with our trip, and the team in general, you can follow my good friend Noah Williams' daily "Vlogs." He started today. Here is his first: Vlog 2/8/11

The First Rule of Mountain Bike Racing

2011-02-04T17:17:00.000-08:00

About mid-week last week I was perusing the TMBRA site as I so often do, and was suddenly reminded that the "Miles of DisComfort" Marathon race was happening that weekend. I thought "why not?" I was feeling almost fully recovered from my battle with the flu. The next morning I quickly sent out a short "who's going?" message to the world by way of email, twitter and facebook (ahhh, the 21st century!). By Thursday evening I had everything lined up and was ready for "DisComfort!" Oh, if only I'd known how true that name would hold!

At 6:00 AM, Derek, our newest Team Bicycle Sport Shop teammate picked me up, and we drove the hour and a half to Comfort. I registered, and felt a bit silly as I bought a "one day license" due to my lack of diligence in renewing my USA Cycling license. I slowly suited up, and, in the spirit of the weekend, executed a very relaxed 1o minute warm-up.

As we gridded up I was happy to see that we had a nice strong field, with such Texas heavy-hitters as Bryan Fawley, Tristan Uhl, David Haines, Jorge Muñoz and Wiley Mosley, among others. With 30 seconds to go before the start, I hacked up one last big mouthful of phlegm. Tristan next to me grinned and said: "After these four hours you'll either be all better... or in the hospital."

The gun went off, and after a few minutes of jockeying around, we each settled into our own respective paces. Tristan's pace... well let's just say he waisted very little time in "checking out." No one would see him again until he stood at the finish line, in his street clothes, cheering us in. He won by that much.

My tempo ended up slotting me into no-mans-land, minutes behind a small group at the front, and minutes in front of any chasers. I would end up spending the remaining 4 hours and 5 minutes of the race completely solo. This was only one of the components that made it mentally one of the toughest races I've ever done.

Lonely, lonely riding. But still having fun at this point.

For the first 3 laps or so, (around 40 miles) I kept the Bryan Fawley, Jorge Muñoz, David Haines group at about 2 minutes. Seeing them in the distance several times per lap helped motivate me to keep my nose to the grindstone.

Bored and not putting in the best performance of my life, I decided I needed to do something quasi productive, and styled it up a bit off the Hospital Hill drop.

Around the 2 hour mark I started to notice some tenderness coming from the "under-carriage" area. The course was much rougher than I'd remembered, and riding it on a 26" hardtail was taking its tole. A less than robust chamois was not helping the matter.

About halfway through the third loop, 2 1/2 hours into the race, I felt the first twitch in my quadriceps muscles. My heart sunk. Not once have I made it through a marathon race without cramping, but I usually don't start having problems until a half hour or so from the finish. At this point in the race, I had an hour and a half to go. I focussed on being smooth on the climbs, and stepped back the pace just a hair. To try and make up the difference, I began attacking the descents much more aggressively.

Around this time I caught Wiley Mosley. Despite being a good friend of mine, when on the race course he is still a competitor. With that in mind, I kept my mouth shut about the fact that I was starting to cramp. Tactics can play quite a role in these longer races, especially when you know some of what your competitor is feeling.

Near the end of the third loop my quadriceps started cramping for real, periodically convulsing in hard, painful contractions. Knowing I had an hour plus of racing left, I shifted down into the very light 26 tooth chainring. I've found that by using a higher cadence I can often stave off cramping.

In the feed zone I loaded up with twice the amount of fuel I normally would for a lap, knowing it would help me wring one more hour out of my body. By this time the saddle sores had developed into something seriously painful, and I was forced to shift positions often. Unfortunately, this forced my legs to do more work as I stood. A vicious cycle ensued. No matter what I did, something was always yelling at me to "STOP HURTING US NOW!"

I tried not to think about the fact that I still had an hour of the toughest terrain in Texas to get my body and bike over, and just focussed on turning the pedals.

I downed three gels in the first five minutes of the loop, trying to stockpile calories, hoping to ward off the inevitable "total lock-up" just a bit longer. I had started to get that deep hunger in the bottom of my stomach, and thought about how much I was going to enjoy cramming my face with some heavy, unhealthy meaty thing once I crossed the finish line... you're never picky at the end of these races. As an indicator of how starved for calories I'd become, I literally turned around at one point on the course and went back a few yards to get some electrolyte blocks someone had dropped.

I found myself spinning in nearly the lightest gear I had, crawling uphill... still the legs cramping on and off. Finally at the top, on the "Mini Kelly Creek" ridge, the legs could have a bit of respite. Only now the brutal ledges and rocks victimized my hands and forearms. Blisters started to form on my palms, and my fingers cramped in lifeless fists around the handle bars. The descents became extremely nerve-wracking, as I held on for dear life, my hands completely drained of any strength.

My speed slowed and slowed as I played cat and mouse with the cramping of my legs. As soon as I'd feel them convulse I'd shift down a cog, and try altering my pedal stroke, using different muscles.

So focussed was I on this ballet of pain that I suddenly found myself face down in the trail. I still don't really know what happened, all of a sudden I just found myself slammed onto the ground. I lay for a few moments (it always feels like an eternity), and squeezed my eyes tightly shut. Then I let out a loud "AAAARRRRGGGGG!" Maybe hoping a course marshal was around to offer sympathy and acknowledge my lonely misery. I finally forced my way up, only to have what felt like every muscle in my body ball up into an agonizing cramp. I quickly lay back down. I tried massaging my trashed legs, but my hands were far too weak and tired to do any good.

I eventually managed to get up, and retrieved my bike. I'll be perfectly honest: As I slung my leg back over the top tube and clipped in, I whimpered a little bit. My body was done, and yet I was telling it to go again.

As I got going, something felt funny, and I realized my stem and handle bars had slipped from their alignment with the wheel. Instead of being at a 90º, they were at about a 70º. I stopped and tried straightening them, but was unsuccessful.

Having more or less gathered myself physically after the fall, I took a moment and gathered myself mentally. I told myself to swallow my pride and just get the job done, even if I had to walk it in. Above all else I wanted to honor the first rule of mountain bike racing: Always finish. Always.

The last half hour of the race was a death march. The new angle to the handlebars made staying on the trail interesting at times.

But then finally, FINALLY, after 4 hours and 10 minutes of some of the greatest discomfort I've ever felt, I rolled across the finish line, and could relax.

After the race. Broken.

I ended up finishing in 6th place, and days behind winner Tristan Uhl. It was not a fast, pretty or fun 4 hours, but I think I gained physical, and even more so, mental strength. Our sport, among other things, is about suffering, and I had absolutely done that in spades.

And I wasn't the only one. As more and more riders exhausted and broken coasted across the finish line, it all started to come back to me: The feeling of pride and accomplishment. I wondered how much of the population could say they'd taken their body to the limit in such a way. We certainly could. Congratulations finishers of the 2011 "Miles of DisComfort" Marathon! Y'all have quite a bit to be proud of.

The "local" StarFlight team was out practicing in the area, and decided to drop by and watch some of the action.

An Unplanned Rest Week

2011-01-25T14:57:00.000-08:00

Nobody likes being sick, especially those of us that are extra active. This past Thursday I woke up with a nasty sore throat and achy feeling all over. My reaction, when it finally registered in my groggy mind that I was sick, was simply: "Seriously?" I immediately started assessing how bad I really felt, trying to decide whether or not I could get my scheduled workout done. In the following 45 minutes as I went about my usual preparation for school I obsessed over the decision, and found myself making a mental pros and cons list. Was the risk of training while sick worth it? How much would missing a training day cost me in the grand scheme? I found it an extremely difficult dilemma. Common sense tells me that missing a day of training will hardly matter at all once we reach the racing season. However, there is something to be said for developing a hardworking, gritty approach to training- Regardless of weather, time, mood or whatever, "gettin'er done no matter what," can be key to success as a professional athlete. Besides, I was well enough to go school, wasn't I?

By the time we were headed out the door, my backpack that the night before I'd so neatly packed with shoes, kit, helmet, bottles etc. stayed at home, along with my bike.

A few hours later, during Economics class I did another assessment of my condition, and tried to envision myself doing hard intervals once school was over. Again, common sense told me to just relax for a day.

I went home, got my homework done, and went to bed early... thoughts of crushing the next day's interval workout floating through my head.

I woke up the next morning feeling awful... worse then the day before. This time, my reaction was a bit more colorful than just: "Seriously?" I went to school for just the morning, getting the classes done that I'd been finding more difficult. By the early afternoon I was in bed asleep.

I woke on Saturday. "Ahh, the weekend!" I thought. But found I only felt marginally better.

By this point I was simply frustrated, realizing I was both missing valuable training days, and missing out on some fun, longer mountain bike rides with friends. I had the whole day to convince myself to accept the stakes and focus on getting better, not fret over missing training days.

Each day I've gradually improved, but it's been a virus unlike I've had before. Never any symptoms too awful, just a lingering, lingering, lingering.

Today I was finally at the point where I could ride again, and found it to be unbelievably relieving. After almost a week of worrying and second-guessing about training, it felt wonderful to finally get out and ride. In reality, likely very little was lost fitness/strength wise during the whole ordeal. In fact, the renewed focus and determination I gained from being tied down for a period of time may outweigh any sort of form I may have lost. Competitive athletes in all sports go through these small hiccups nearly every year. In hindsight, I likely did lose a bit of perspective on the "big picture" while bed-ridden, however it did remind me of how much I really do love this sport. Now, time to get back to working hard!

2011-01-20T17:20:00.000-08:00

"Of all the sports, cycling is the one that requires the most perfect match of man and machine. The more perfect the match, the more perfect the result." ~Paul Cornish

Without a doubt, one of the most unique aspects of our sport is the equipment involved. Along with racing, our industry is fueled by the technology. With thousands upon thousands of companies big and small working to improve the riders experience, the rate of innovation is unparalleled.

For the last three years I have been in the wonderful position of being able to race some of the most innovative and cutting edge bicycles on the planet. I'm excited to be able to say that this year will be no different.

As in 2009 and 2010, for 2011 I have chosen to race the Specialized S-Works Stumpjumper 26", which I feel is the fastest cross-country mountain bike race machine you can buy. Let's take a look:

Between 2009 and 2010, the bikes remained largely the same, with the only change being an upgrade to SRAM XX in 2010, from the XTR of 2009. For 2011, hardly anything wasn't changed. The frame was completely redesigned making this flyweight even lighter, as well as stiffer.

The tapered headtube remains, making the front end super stiff and responsive.

Although probably hard to appreciate in this picture, the top tube has been beefed up even more, contributing to an unbelievably stiff front end. After only one ride I can already tell the difference, and can't wait to get on a course with a lot of accelerating.

When redesigning the frame, Specialized engineers wanted to build a more compliant, smoother rear end for the bike. The tubes are thinner than in previous years, but not at the cost of stiffness. They are somewhat flat in shape, making for side to side rigidity, while allowing for more vertical compliance in the rough stuff. When I first jumped on the bike and coasted down the driveway the difference was immediately apparent. I literally went back and checked my tire pressure to make sure I wasn't running 10 psi lower then I thought I was... the ride was that much smoother. I am very excited about this aspect of the new bike.

Greater clearance around the chainstays for sloppy races. This should help in Europe...

Smart looking new graphics for the fork. Although not yet clear on the details, I have been told the suspension has been improved as well.

One of the things I really feel sets the Specialize mountain bikes apart: Their BRAIN technology for suspension. I can't imagine being without it.

A clue to the collaboration with Rock Shox in development of the fork: This sweet little graphic on the right fork leg.

One of the most significant and hyped changes for 2011 are the latest edition of the Roval XC race wheels. A completely new design...

... and yep, that's carbon. Listed at a breathtaking 1200 grams, these outstrip Stan's wheels as the lightest on the market. Pair'em with the marvelous S-Works Renegade 1.9" tires and I believe they'll be fastest set of wheels anywhere in 2011.

The SRAM XX brakes appear to be new for 2011, however I am not yet privy to the details. The reservoir in particular seems to have been redesigned. The stealth black looks snazzy by itself, but simply killer with the rest of the bike's paint scheme.

The SRAM XX drivetrain seems to be the same in 2011. Still the best out there.

Every piece on the bike is designed for speed. A highly machined top cap to save some grams.

A small but very appreciated touch: Removable rubber "booties" for the bottoms of the crank arms. I'm sure these will see plenty of action on the Barton Creek Greenbelt this year.

The bike is listed at under 18 lbs., but I am holding off on doing a formal weigh-in until I have the bottle cage and pedals I'm going to race with, on the bike. The stealth/Darth Vader paint scheme is quite different from last year- the simplistic elegance seeming to reflect its nature: Clean, refined, and an absolute rocket on the racecourse. Thank you Bicycle Sport Shop for giving me the opportunity to race such an incredible machine!

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

2011-01-18T16:28:00.000-08:00

It's January 18th. Normally by this time of year I would have already written a "New Years, New Season" piece, giving an idea of what 2011 may hold. I feel there is a very good reason for the tardiness, which I will explain in a moment.

For all bike racers, but I think junior racers in particular, the new year symbolizes the beginning of many new things. Whether it be equipment, teams, sponsors, goals, dreams... whatever, January 1st is the day we turn our backs on the season before, and look to the future. Maybe 2010 was a struggle, and 2011 brings the opportunity to turn a new leaf. Possibly last season was your best yet, and you can't wait to build on its successes.

For me, 2011 will bring many "firsts", but also a few "lasts." For example, this will be my last year as a Junior racer, as well as my last year in high school. However, it will also see my first days of college (probably), and days living independently (yikes!).

Ironically, one new development of 2011 is what's currently keeping me from writing that formal "New Year, New Season" post! As we speak, a professional website is being built to take the place of this Blogspot. It will have all kinds of features including photo galleries, a results page, a blog (of course!) and much, much more. It should be up and running in not too long. With this in mind I am trying to hold off on posting an outline of my season, so hang tight!

For now, here's a little teaser of what the next blog post may hold. An introduction to a new friend of mine:

A Closer Look: Oakley Icon Pack 3.0

2011-01-16T19:13:00.000-08:00

A few weeks back I said a little bit about the Oakley Icon Pack 3.0, and how after only a few outings, I was completely smitten. I like it so much, it's getting a whole post dedicated to it.

The Oakley Icon Pack 3.0 is a large (52.4 Liters) backpack built to handle anything. It's spacious enough to satisfy your inner pack-rat, and, although I haven't tried it, seems it could even carry enough for some short multi-day hikes. That said, it is not so large that it can't be used around town, or on campus. It's built with durability in mind, but has many features that make schlepping your more fragile items a breeze. For example, purpose made, heavily padded compartments for your laptop, phone, iPod or most any other gizmo. Mesh pockets ordain the outside of the pack, making for quick access to clothing, water-bottles etc.

Oakley is most well-known for their eyewear, so the purpose made compartments come as no surprise. With a slew of straps, buckles and zippers to help keep even the most obscure pieces of cargo secure, there is no doubt that this pack is built for meeting your every need.

The main compartment is massive, here beautifully filled with everything that was strewn on my bedroom floor, plus Mom's laptop.

A padded sleeve keeps your laptop safe. A secondary side zipper also makes for super quick access.

The secondary compartment boasts a unique double-flap, velcro design. Inside are padded compartments for your electronics, as well as slots for writing implements.

I soon discovered this outer compartment was also the perfect size for a helmet. On Friday you can take it to school, and Saturday to the cyclocross race. Genius.

A convenient mesh sleeve to quickly stash your eyewear.

Two large zippered side pockets can be found on either side of the pack, making for even more storage space if needed.

Near the top of the pack, a soft pouch and headphone port for your media player.

On the left front should strap, a mesh pocket for you phone. No more frantic rooting around when the phone rings!

Adjustable shoulder, hip and chest straps keep even the heaviest loads secure and comfortable, whether hiking or flying down the trail.

A unique feature of the pack is it's highly adjustable chest strap. "Rails" allow the strap to be slid up and down to fit different body types.

Yet more storage space with this large external mesh "trough," perfect for water bottles or... Chamois Butt'r?

Lastly, the thing just looks plain sick... but it's from Oakley, so what did you expect?

I could not be happier with this pack, and look forward to using it as often as I get a chance. With its versatility, I bet that ends up being pretty often.

Gearing Up

2010-12-24T16:31:00.003-08:00

The other day I met with my Oakley contact and picked up some of my new gear. For a half hour or so he listened to what I needed, made some suggestions, and gave me a bit of an intro to the company. I walked away with some very, very awesome Oakley product and was having trouble wrapping my head around the fact that I was really on board. Like I said earlier, it was a dream come true. I thought I'd share some of the highlights with y'all.

I hadn't had a pair of Jawbones before and so was really, really excited to not only finally have some of my own, but see first hand how incredible this piece of eyewear is. One thing I wasn't previously aware of was how customizable they are. For the last few days I've been messing around with different combinations of the frames, jaws and bolts. For today's on-bike Christmas delivery run, I cooked up these semi-Xmas edition ones.

Another highlight is this Oakley Icon Pack 3.0 Beautifully modeled here by my wonderful mother.

It's packed with features and attention to detail that make it obvious how much Oakley "just gets it." I finally got to break it in today, as I made a special trip, by bike of course, from the house into town. I paid Pa a visit at work and left him with some of Lily's tasty Christmas cookies. Then I headed towards down town to drop off some treats for the good folks at Bicycle Sport Shop. The only hitch in the matter was that it was cold and pouring rain. I did my best to wrap the goodies in a plastic bag and crossed my fingers in hopes that the deluge would only do minimal damage. At first I was amazed that, when I opened the pack, everything was bone dry. Then, on second thought, I wouldn't really expect anything less from Oakley. I don't know if they market this pack as water proof, but if not, they should. It got pounded by rain for 2 straight hours and yet not a drop of water got inside.

In case you can't tell, I'm pretty stoked on this backpack. So much so, I think I'll do a proper 'product review' of it at some point in the near future. Until then, Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Joining Forces with Oakley

2010-12-09T16:06:00.001-08:00

I am very proud and excited to announce that I will be working with Oakley in 2011!

Even before entering the cycling world, I had an admiration for Oakley. I think what first attracted me to them was their mastery of joining matchless form with impeccable function. To me, they make the best looking products in the market by far, but also the highest quality. After getting to know the bike racing scene over the last few years, my respect for Oakley has only grown. I realized that many of the athletes that I have looked up to as role models and heroes, such as Lance Armstrong, Todd Wells and Geoff Kabush, among many others, also work closely with Oakley. Just like I decided I wanted to become a professional bike racer and make my passion my job, I dreamed of one day being sponsored by Oakley, and becoming part of that family. Boy does it feel good to be able to say I've accomplished that goal!

Stay tuned, as I'll be posting some words and pictures of the new stuff. To paraphrase Taylor Phinney: "Thank you Oakley for adding freshness to my face..."

I started using Oakley sunglasses mid way through last season. Never looking back! (Pun sorta intended)

Thank You!

2010-09-27T15:15:00.000-07:00

Well it has been a long, eventful season, and it is finally time to shut the door on Season 2010. It was a year of new, incredible experiences, from racing in Europe for the first time, to winning a ProXCT (National) race, to racing a World Cup and riding for Team U.S.A. on the National Development squad. None of the experiences I had could have come about without the incredible support of so many. There are so, so many people I am indebted to:

First, thank you to Bicycle Sport Shop. The best bike shop on the planet, run by some of the best, nicest people around. They have supported me in so many ways the last few seasons. From their stellar service work, to equipment, to words of advice and encouragement and everything in between, thank you.

Thanks to the team, Team Bicycle Sport Shop. What a great group of people to race, travel, train and ride with! Thanks to all of you.

Thank you to USA Cycling. Their incredible support and knowledge allowed me to race and gain experience at the highest level of the sport this year. Thank you for the work that you do.

Thank you to Specialized. It's your bicycles and equipment that I have fallen in love with, and I feel so fortunate to have your support. I look forward to many more years together!

Specialized's S-Works MTB shoe is one of the very lightest and stiffest out there. However, the other day while slipping them on I suddenly realized how they still looked brand new. Sure, I'd given them a quick wipe down, but never before have I had a shoe last so long and look so good after a full season of mud racing and running. I've never seen or heard of a shoe so race oriented being this durable. Check out more about these special shoes here.

Thank you to Oakley. I was beyond excited to finally get my hands on my very own pair of Radars!

I was so stoked to be rocking my brand new Radars in Europe.

Thank you to Christian Williams and the entire LoneStar Works family. I don't think a whole lot needs to be said between Christian and me. He and I know what a pivotal role he plays in my racing and riding endeavors. Thank you.

Thanks to Ginie Webber of Hands-On Massage Therapy. A good rubdown after a week of balancing school and strenuous training has become one of the most important parts of my preparation. Thanks for making the legs feel good!

Thank you to the TMBRA crew. How lucky we are to have such a fun, well organized race series in the Lone Star State!

Thank you to all the individuals who have given so much of their time and support along the way. Derek, Wiley, Hill, Clay... I cannot thank you enough.

Most of all, thank you to my family. You know why.

The past couple of weeks I have been taking some time away from training, and enjoying some other activities: I recently got my hands on a proper Dirt Jump bike, and promptly built a sweet road gap across the driveway. The pumptrack is also slowly being reclaimed. I've also been going out to some of my High School's track practices. It's been a very fun way to stay in reasonable shape. I was also pleasantly surprised to find that I can still hold my own as well... heck I caught myself wishing the other day after a particularly strong 50 sec. test that I still had time to run competitively! Ahh well, priorities!

Over the next few weeks I will continue to stay relaxed about training, and try to get myself mentally prepared for an all out assault of the competition in 2011!

Thanks for reading!

Windham World Cup

2010-09-06T07:45:00.000-07:00

The last big goal of the 2009/2010 Mountain bike season for me was to be the biggest race of my life so far: my first World Cup, at World Cup Finals in Windham, NY. Not only would it be my first ever World Cup race, but the first time a World Cup was held on American soil in over five years.

I arrived on a Thursday, and our race was Saturday, so I had a couple days to get settled in. Two days before a race I typically take a rest day, so I decided to spin a little bit on some of the roads around the little town of Windham. In only a half hour I probably saw 20 of the legendary pro racers that are my heroes, such as Geoff Kabush, Todd Wells, Catherine Pendrel, Burry Stander, and Jose Hermida... which turned my little spin into more of an excited tempo ride.

On Friday I pre-rode the course. Unfortunately, it was a bit of an old school ski-resort course, with a long climb, and then long descent. However, I think the course designers did an excellent job, and made it by far the best ski-resort course I've ever ridden. The descents weren't too technical or steep, like what I had faced in Europe, but with the slight glaze of rain and mud to the sharp roots and rocks, there were still plenty of opportunities to really hurt yourself.

During the pre-ride I had had some slight shifting issues, so I headed to the Specialized tent to see if they could lend a hand. I rolled up, staring at Cristophe, Burry and Todd like they were some kind of endangered species of animal in a zoo, while they suited up for their pre-rides. Myron, Todd's mechanic, was kind enough to tweak my drivetrain and get it running smoothly again. Thanks Myron! My dream is to one day be the Todd, Burry or Cristoph on Specialized Factory Racing, racing the World Cups and having young racers passing by gawking at me! One day...

Race morning came, and I was without a doubt the most nervous I have ever been before a race. Once I got out on my bike however, and started warming up, I started to feel a bit more comfortable, but still pretty star-stuck as to what I'd gotten myself into. Like in the pre-ride, my body didn't feel quite right. My legs weren't necessarily 'bad', just that something was slightly off. It very well could have simply been that I was very nervous. During the warm-up the typical passing and sizing up of the competition was taken to a whole new level: "Man, that Hungarian has some massive quads," or, "That Brit is a Junior?! He looks like he's 25 years old!"or, "Ahh, I can take that Swede..."

Eventually we were called to staging, and I must say I felt a bit of pride when my name was called with: "For Team U.S.A., Payson McElveen." I was surprised to learn that there were only 21 competitors in the race. The U.S.A., Danish, Swedish, Hungarian, New Zealand, and British World Championships teams would be competing, but the French, German, Swiss, Spanish and Canadian Worlds teams would not be competing. Although at the race and some of them even watching ours, those countries national team coaches felt it was smarter not to risk injury or tired legs the weekend before World Champs.

Despite my disappointment in the small field, when I lined with the best 17-18 year old mountain bike racers from countries all over the globe, I didn't find it hard at all to get my game face on.

The race started unbelievably fast, and after a good first half mile, I started creeping backwards from my 6th or 7th position. Halfway up the climb I was sitting back in 16th place and struggling to get my body going. I felt very sluggish, and although was putting out every ounce of energy, didn't feel like I was moving very fast. Although the legs didn't feel particularly tired or worn out, they just lacked any spark, zip or pop that is often felt on race day. Realizing this, I settled into my own tempo, and knew I'd just have to ride a steady race. By the last lap, I'd slowly worked my way up to 14th, and was breathing down the neck of fellow American, Will Curtis. Unfortunately, I just didn't quite have enough in me that day, and couldn't close down the gap, finishing half a minute behind him.

My friend Seth Kemp, the King of the U.S. junior field put in an absolutely stellar result with a 2nd place! Big congratulations to him.

At the finish, although unsatisfied with my result, I was mostly disappointed that I hadn't felt good during the race. There are two kinds of pain in bike racing: The good pain, where you're able to give everything your body has to offer and able to ride on the limit; and the not so good pain, where you're fighting the bike and the legs are feeling flat. Unfortunately I felt the second kind of pain that day.

That said, I was very happy with the experience and overall feeling I came away with from the event. I can see that, although I have lots of work to do this next season (my last as a junior), I'm in the mix. I feel I have had a door opened on nearly limitless possibilities.

The rest of the weekend Pa and I walked around the expo area, gawked at the pros as they warmed up, and then watched an incredible show, both in the men and women's races. It was a wonderful experience and one that I will always remember. Now if I can just figure out how to get 10.5 minutes faster between now and the next time I face the fastest in the world . . . .

I imagine I'll be keeping these for the ol' scrap book...

Head down, and deep in the pain cave. Fighting through a pretty mediocre day on the bike.

10:39. I'm going to write that down and tape it to my top tube.

The photos are courtesy of Kathy Johnson. Thanks Kathy!

Win a 2011 Specialized Rockhopper Mountain Bike!

2010-08-15T07:13:00.001-07:00

Free stuff is always nice, but a free BIKE!? You better believe it. To find how you could win the all new for 2011 Specialized Rockhopper, follow this link: FREE BIKE. You'll be very happy you did!

Photo Special (plus a few videos)

2010-08-11T08:37:00.000-07:00

It's been an awfully long time since my last post, so before I do anything else, I'll quickly catch y'all up on what I've been doing:

After Wisconsin, Pa and I loaded up the trusty VW again, and started the second leg of our journey across the country: To our vacation home in Maine. "Twillingate Farm" is a beautiful 19th century home, that my great grandparents bought back in the 1940s. It's situated in the rolling hills and mountains of the White Mountains area of Maine and New Hampshire. Normally at this time in the year, I'd be preparing for the National Championships. However, because the race venue was again at altitude, we decided to focus our energy and expenses towards racing the World Cup Finals, in Windham, NY. Instead of going to Nationals, I'd get to spend a month of real vacation relaxing at "The Farm" with extended family, as well as taking advantage of the unbelievable training opportunities in the area.

I ended up having a wonderful time. It was the perfect cross between vacation and continued serious training. I got in countless hours of ripping legendary East Coast singletrack, scaling inspiring sky-scraping road climbs, as well as more relaxed fishing, hiking and generally enjoying life.

After that blissful month, I returned, FINALLY, to home. Incredibly, despite only having spent 12 hours at home in the last two months, I didn't particularly miss it. I did, however, miss Yampa and Chama, our two Rhodesian Ridgebacks. The last two months had been such a whirlwind of excitement and new experiences, that I simply hadn't had the time to miss home. That said, sleeping in my own bed and being with "The Pups" has been a wonderful sigh of relief I didn't even know I needed.

We're now fast approaching mid-August, which means two things for me: Less than two weeks until senior year of highschool starts (uuuggggghhhhhh), and about 3 weeks until the biggest race of my life: World Cup Finals in Windham, NY. Since I've gotten back from Maine, my life has revolved around preparing for those two things. Before I completely shut the door on summer 2010 however, I wanted to share some things from Germany. Going through my pictures from the summer, I realized I have quite a few from my trip to Europe that didn't make it onto previous blog posts. So rather than write some long over-arching, philosophical "haleluja" sermon, here is a "slideshow" from my time in Europe. Enjoy!

Overlooking Kirchzarten.

Team U.S.A. cruising through town.

While pre-riding Albstadt, I fell off a switchback and free-fell 6 feet. It was scary as heck, but luckily all that came of it was a sore knee and bruised ego.

Ahhhhh, glorious European weather.

Mike, our awesome mechanic for the two week camp, dialing in Ryan Standish's bike before a training ride.

Our home for the two week camp. A beautiful hostel/farm outside of Kirchzarten. The surrounding hills of the Black Forest were laced with pristine singletrack. Also, literally right across the road was the 1995 XC World Championships course, kept in mint condition by proud locals.

A shrine nestled in the hills outside of Frieburg. Access by hiking trails only.

On singletrack way up above Frieburg.

During one of our rides, we ran across this little handmade water feature on a trail miles from the nearest town.

There are tons of these kiosks scattered up in the hills above Kirchzarten. The billboard describes training techniques for nordic skiing.

Apparently the house was built before the road was, and the owners didn't want to move. In a distance of about 100 meters, a two lane road narrows to one, and two train tracks merge to one. Then, both merge together and go right through the house. Euro sketchiness! The bike paths, of course, get two tunnels all their own.

Downtown Frieburg. The Europeans like their bikes. My kind of people!

A typical lunch for me over in Europe: Fresh baked bread from the 'market' just a few paces out the front door (sometimes it was still warm!), freshly picked lettuce from the garden, real Dijon mustard, fresh turkey and ham, and of course the world famous European cheese.

The best cereal on the planet. I'd kill to get it in the U.S.

The second best cereal on the planet. I'd kill to get my hands on some of this too. We ate faaaaaar, too much of this stuff.

Watching the World Cup became a staple of our daily routine.

Upon arrival at the Engelburg, Switzerland race, the area was blanketed in heavy, thick clouds...

...that momentarily hid the beauty of the area. In the evening, the clouds lifted somewhat, and we got some views of the incredible Swiss Alps that Englelburg is surrounded by.

About to enter Switzerland for the first time in my life! Hopefully the first of many trips to come.

The jokester of the group (and soon-to-be crowned National Champ) Skyler Trujillo, posing with his "double bike box-duct tape job." He got as far as baggage check-in at the airport with that one...

The view, looking out from the balcony of our third floor 'apartment.'

Bikes packed and we're off to the train station.

At the train station in Frieburg. A long day of travel back to Austin has just begun.

Germ tube, size extra large.

My first, and last, cup of coffee, courtesy of Lufthansa Int.

Flying over what I think was Ireland. Wish we could have taken a quick pit stop...

And finally home... for just twelve hours. Enough time to unpack, repack and hit the road for Wisconsin.

Seth has some serious bike handling skills. Even on recovery days he can't seem to keep both wheels on the ground. Here he demonstrates what Adam Craig is always trying to pull off as he crosses the finish line in a race: One handed wheelie. Vurrr nice.

Skyler and I decided to trade bikes on our way down to Kirchzarten one day. He said he really loved the Specialized Brain Fork.... shhhhh, don't tell his sponsors!

A video of the handmade water feature we came across on one of our rides up in the hills.

Wisconsin ProXCT

2010-07-01T10:52:00.000-07:00

This passed weekend was the Wisconsin ProXCT race. After getting home from Germany, I had one evening to build my bike, unpack my bags and repack them, before Pa and I left the next morning to drive to Wisconsin.

The drive went smoothly, and thanks to our awesome if antique VW van, I was able to stretch out and have a comfortable drive across the country. It was a welcome change to the tiny cars, trains and planes of the passed two weeks.

Upon arriving in Mt. Morris, a small ski resort in the country side of Wisconsin, we set up camp. Two days before the race, there was hardly anyone, and we wondered if we'd gotten the weekend right! By lunch time the day before the race however, it was very clear the race was going to be a big deal.

I was able to pre-ride the short, 4.5-5 mile course three times before the race, and loved it every time. It consisted of fun, fast singletrack in the trees, punctuated by slippery 'babyhead' rocks and roots. By the third lap I had the course dialed and was loving it! It was definitely the best National race course I'd ever ridden, and maybe even my favorite course, period!

Race day came, and the venue was packed with people. On the start line we had a fairly small field consisting of some local and national fast juniors as well as my friend Ryan Standish, the defending Aussie National champ. Also top junior Will Curtis was on hand.

We started the race with the other Cat 1 men's categories, but luckily I got a front row start position, so it wasn't an issue. The gun went off and I got a good start, in good position going into the singletrack. A few minutes in and a lead group had formed containing Ryan Standish, Will Curtis and me, with Chase Dickens yo-yoing off the back for a few miles. I decided to ride conservatively at the start, not really believing that I was finding it so easy to ride with Will.

After a lap, the three of us stayed together, until Ryan launched an attack going into lap two. In hindsight, I should have gone with him, but when Will didn't react, I thought I should probably sit back. I was working hard, but not on my limit. I was stoked about holding Will's wheel, but wasn't ready this early in the race to try and drop him. Ryan put time into us fast, and opened up a sizable gap. Around the end of lap 2, I noticed Will was starting to make some mistakes, especially in one section, and I made a mental note to hit him there next time around. Throughout lap three I became more and more comfortable, and once I made my attack, had plenty of pop to open up a gap. I put my head down and focussed on penning it on the descents and attacking every climb as hard as I could.

At the finish Ryan was 1:50 ahead of me and second place around a minute up. I was surprised I had finished third and not second, but guess the second placed guy snuck around me at some point, unnoticed. It wouldn't have been hard to overlook a competitor as there were tons of racers from other categories on course. At one point Ryan supposedly had almost three minutes on Will and me, so I closed the gap to him substantially on the last lap. That said, he was incredibly strong that day, and was for sure the strongest guy out on course. Congrats to him! Will ended up coming in a little less than a minute behind me.

After cleaning up and getting some lunch, my dad and I went back to the course to watch the Pros race. We were in for a real treat, as the racecourse is laid out perfectly for spectating. In one area, you can watch the racers come by on a fast, tight switchback climb, see them again crossing a section to your right side, and then turn around and watch them come blasting down the most technical descent on the course. Obviously, quite a few people had the same idea we did- I would guess over 200 spectators were packed into this one area! There were hundreds more scattered around in groups across the hill. Thanks to the free beergarden all the spectators were 'nicely lubed.' It felt like Europe.

We took the chair lift up to the top of the hill to watch the race from a different vantage point, and got see much of the action unfold as the course twisted and wound underneath us. The more we watched, the more we realized how incredibly well the course was laid, both for maximum fun while racing, AND spectating.

As we and at least 600+ other spectators watched Sam Schultz finally get his first Pro win, it was a night to remember. The people at WORS (Wisconsin Offroad Racing Series) put on THE best race I have ever been to. Not only was it the best National or International race, but even organized and run better than some of out exemplerary local TMBRAs! The course was amazing, the expo huge with all kinds of demos and interactive things going on, the organization impecable and equal number fans to the International European races I just raced in Germany. The event in general was on a different level than I have ever seen, and I heard much of the same from many of the Pros. Not only do I hope it's ProXCT again next year, but it definitely has my vote for hosting the National Championships for the next couple of years. Heck, this thing could easily become a World Cup race in a few years!

Here are some pictures and a few videos from the race:

Pro Men on the start line

There were quite a few spectators out for the race. This is at the bottom of the most technical descent.

The terrain was very lush and green, making for a very "East Coast" feeling course.

The view from the top of the ski hill. Not single other hill as far as the eye can see.

This is just a few minutes into the Pro Men's race. It's hard to tell, but that's a pretty steep grassy hill that they're flying up.

This is the lead group of Todd, JHK, Sam Schultz and Plaxton right after the technical descent.

The lead group coming through part of the techy descent.

Sid Taberlay didn't have his greatest race ever, but still entertained the crowd. Sorry the video isn't better. He was the only person brave enough to launch off the drop and gap the rest of the rock garden. It wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that there's a tight off camber turn right after it, with spectators standing inches from the line.

Engelburg Racer Bikes Cup

2010-06-25T11:56:00.000-07:00

My second race over in Europe was the Engelburg Racer Bikes Cup in the heart of the Swiss Alps. After learning so much from the previous weekend's experiences, I was very excited with the opportunity at a second stab at some Euro racing!

Our drive to the race went far more smoothly than the previous weekend's, however the team in general didn't seem to be in quite as high of spirits. It had rained nearly non-stop in the days prior, and during the entire drive, the weather alternated between a heavy fog and light rain.

This just about says it all. A pretty quiet car trip to the race.

The venue was situated in a high valley, surrounded by even higher peaks. We were in one of the most beautiful areas in Europe, and the world for that matter, but unfortunately the weather wasn't allowing us to see much. After getting out of the van at the venue, we realized the temperature was only in the low 50s!

I somewhat grudgingly got kitted up, and we rolled out into the cold rain to pre-ride the course. I was wearing everything I'd brought, and was still a bit chilly. I hoped it wouldn't be any colder or wetter tomorrow... oh, if only I'd known what we were in for! Despite being extremely muddy, I ended up very much liking the course. It seemed to suit me, with a 6 or 7 minute climb on paved/ gravel roads up, and a fast slippery descent down. Towards the end of the lap, a steep, wide, grassy section went down a steep hillside. It was thick, deep mud and SUPER steep, but using what I had learned from Albstadt, was able to ride it cleanly. After that was a long flat mud bog, cyclocross style, that was all about who could carry the most momentum and slog it out.

After the pre-ride we went back to the hotel, showered and settled down to watch some FIFA World Cup action. We also found a channel in english: MTV, and proceeded to watch the same music videos over and over... just because it was something we could understand!

I walked out on the back porch of our hotel and found that the clouds had lifted a bit, just barely letting some of the monstrous mountains that we had no idea had been there, to peak out. They were all covered in snow:

Race morning came, and after a wonderful German/Swiss breakfast of bread, Nutella, meat, more bread and more meat, we began to prepare for the race. It was raining, and the thermometers were reading in the mid 30s F! We began warming up on the trainers and under our tents because of the awful weather. I was bundled up in every piece of cycling clothing I'd brought, and despite putting in some good hard warm-up efforts, didn't even break a sweat. As I spun there, watching the low clouds and dumping rain, I just imagined the already extremely muddy course turning into something, well, I couldn't imagine!

We stripped off our heavy jackets, and just wearing the U.S.A. kit and arm warmers, made our way to the start. I was already freezing. I had only brought my regular summer, half finger gloves, and waiting at the starting line, was already regretting it. The only reason I slung my leg over the top tube that day, and clipped in, was because it was what we were there to do.

The gun went off, and I presume because I simply hadn't been able to warm-up, had a terrible start. Right from the first ten yards I started losing places, but about 5 minutes up the climb, felt a distinct new sensation in my legs, and started moving back up, passing people. I crested the climb in fairly mediocre position, but in much better placing than I had on the first lap of Albstadt. The descent had become treacherous, in sections simply a muddy stream with icy slick rocks and roots underneath. The freezing cold water and mud was splashed up onto my face and seemed to freeze there from the windchill. Half way down the descent, my fingers began to go completely numb, and I found it increasingly difficult to shift. I was absolutely frozen, but told myself that everyone was racing in the same conditions, and to knuckle down, grit my teeth and tough it out.

After finding the steep open mud pit descent completely unridable due to mud holes and pits up to the hubs, I began the long open flat mud pit cyclocross section. There was a fairly good headwind that battered my bare clinched hands, and I as I went around a turn and tried to pull the break lever, realized my finger simply wouldn't extend from its grasp on the bar, and I went straight past the turn and through the tape.

Coming through the start finish, I yelled at our mechanic and Matt, our coach, asking if they had any full finger gloves, but they didn't. I was just going to have to tough it out.

At this point I was getting a bit angry (which is easy to do when you're at Lactate Threshold), and couldn't believe that this race I had felt so confident about was going down the tubes. My hands continued to lose functionality, until I lost the ability to shift or brake. My legs continued to feel better and better, and I continued to catch and pass racers, but my face and hands were definitely not improving.

The second time down the descent was downright terrifying. To brake, I lifted my entire hand off the grip and pulled with my fist, allowing me to slow down at least a bit. However, on one fairly bumpy section, while clutching the bar with all my power, my hands simply, fell off. I didn't go down, but needless to say, things were getting extremely serious. On the smoother sections I just rested my fists on the tops of the bars, my hands completely useless. When I finally made my way down to the start finish, I had made my decision: Despite this being my last chance at racing in Europe for an entire year, despite friends and family back home rooting for me and giving me all their support, and despite my own hopes, dreams and expections being directly affected by it, I was going to quit the race. As I slid to a stop in front of Matt and Mike, my frozen, mud plastered lips were just barely able to eek out an: "I'm done."

I left my bike at the team van, and walked in the general direction I thought our hotel was. Still just in my sopping wet, muddy and frozen U.S.A. kit, I walked in the freezing rain through the quiet streets of Engelburg. I could imagine just how "Hollywood" the scene must have been. I found the hotel, made it to our room, stripped down and slumped into the bathroom. I curled up/sat in the bottom of the shower, letting the steaming hot water pour over me for at least half an hour.

It is said that racing in Europe both makes and breaks dreams. Although it had broken me today, it has not broken my dreams. Europe, I will be back next year!

Here are a couple of pictures a friend sent me, of the race:

Now just imagine that mud, with 35º F temperatures and rain!

Gonso Albstadt Bundesliga

2010-06-15T09:38:00.000-07:00

My first race in Europe. My first race in a field of over 25 juniors (this one was 60). My first International race (UCI Hors Category). My first race on the USA National Team. Etc. Etc. Albstadt was a race of many firsts for me.

The drive from Kirchzarten for us was about 2 hours. Unfortunately, we had more than one setback along the way. First, we got pulled over for what we thought would a routine security check by the "Policie". After looking through our passports and vehicle papers, they informed us that our coach, Matt Shriver, wasn't actually authorized to drive the rental van. We sat for a good 45 minutes while the cop consulted with his cohorts, and then told us that Gully, (who was the authorized driver and up the road ahead of us by a good hour) would have to come drive us the rest of the way. Before they took off, the police informed Matt that driving without insurance, which he was basically doing, is a felony in Germany. If we made a run for it before Marc got there, they weren't going to let Matt off so easy. Any other policeman and Matt could have easily been hauled off, and finding out what the inside of a German prison looks like. We had been completely let off the hook of something that could have potentially been a very serious situation. One hour later and we were on our way with Gully at the wheel.

After touring around Albstadt completely lost, we finally found the venue. The course started and finished directly in town, with the lap going up a steep forrested hillside. Mike, our awesome British mechanic, got our bikes dialed in and then we went out for some pre-riding. Right off the bat I could tell Euro racing was going to be completely different. The course was INSANE. We would be doing 5 laps of a 5.2 kilometer course. The climbing was steep, but on gravel roads. The descents on the other hand, were something completely different. Steep simply isn't a strong enough word. Seemingly vertical switchbacks, as well as slippery, freefall like schutes. There were tons of manmade features as well, with log drops and rock features. On the first lap, all of us opted to walk down the most technical descent after Skyler ate it pretty hard.

Seth checking out the bikes before our pre-ride

Anything and everything you could possily need for a mountain bike race can be found in the back of that van.

On the second lap, I went for it, and was almost through the descent, but over shot a switchback and freefell over the side 6 feet below. Somehow I only came away with banged up knees, and a large bruise on my quad. Needless to say, as I rolled back to the hotel, I wasn't feeling so confident for race day. My legs had felt absolutely incredible. I had torn up the climbs like I never had before, but was not looking forward to the descents.

Race day came, and until about 6:30 am, we thought the 90% rain chances might be wrong. Unfortunately, about an hour and half from race start, a light drizzle began. 'Warming' up in the light drizzle and 50 degree temperatures, I knew I was going to get the full 'European race experience.' I decided to do half a lap of the course to try and get a feel for how the wet may have changed it. The already nearly unridable (for me) descent had become comically treaturous. The slightly tamer descents had become not unlike cow snot smeared luge courses also. Right then and there I may have made my biggest mistake of the weekend: "This isn't ridable." I told myself, and rode back having already made the desicion that I'd be running.

I rode back to the team van and tents where the rest of the team was warming up and gave them the report. We switched bottles, wiped off drivetrains and made our way to staging. Of the 59 starters, Seth was gridded somewhere in the 3rd row as was Skyler, and Jeremiah, Ryan and I were gridded in the mid 40's, in the next to last row. On the front row were some of central Europe's heaviest hitters, as well as the Junior World Cup leader from the Netherlands, who has swept the three first World Cups of the season.

The gun went off, and the start was surprisingly tame. Unfortunately that was apparently just because I wasn't being aggressive enough, as I found myself losing places. I looked up, and somehow Ryan, Skyler and Seth had already all made it into the top 15 of the race starting up the climb.

The rest of my race all seems to blur together. It consisted of 5 laps, and 1:40 minutes of a very distinct pattern. On the steep climbs, I would pass 5-10 riders, often going by them at what seemed like twice their speed. My legs felt as good as I can ever remember, and I felt like I was flying. On the desents, I executed my plan to perfection. Dismount at the top, and run, fall, slide my way to the bottom. To my amazement, more than 80% of the riders were RIDING the descents. I found myself getting passed back by all those I had just passed on the climbs. The entire race I passed riders on my way up, and got passed right back on the downs. Depsite feeling like I was taking 2 steps forward and one step back, I did slowly make up ground.

For awhile during the race the moral wasn't too high. I felt as though I was just handing the race away; not taking advantage of the incredible legs I had. I was riding 4th out of the five Americans, which was also not exactly as I was hoping. On lap four, I passed Ryan Standish, my USA teammate(he's also the Australian National Champ), putting me as 3rd American on course behind Seth Kemp and Skyler Trujillo.

During one particularly psychotic descent, as I ran, Ryan literaly passed my while sliding on his back, his bike following him. It was a war zone out there.

At the finish, I didn't have a clue where I'd finished. As I had left the Start/Finish area to go out on my last lap, the race leader (and the kid dominating the World Cup series this year) was coming into the finish, meaning I'd missed being lapped by about a minute and a half. Ouch.

I ended up finishing 30th of 59 starters. Mediocre, average, in the middle.... all words that could describe my finish. I wasn't happy. It wasn't the glory filled finish that I had imagined; the one I'd used to motivate myself during countless solo intervals in the months before... but it was a start.

Looking at it from another angle, it wasn't so bad considering the circumstances: Had I had the skill and/or confidence to try riding the descents, my placing could easily have been 10 spots higher. I killed my chances of doing well when I told myself while warming up that "It wasn't ridable.

I learned quite a few things from this race that I intend to take into this coming weekend's race in Switzerland:

-Be more aggressive at the start. Coming to the top of a slippery, narrow descent behind 50 other racers doesn't stand you in good stead for making the lead group.

-It's better to risk a crash then lose 45 seconds on every descent because you're running. I'm racing at the top level of my sport these two weeks, and now is NOT the time to be conservative or think long term. For this season, it's now or never at these races. At Engleberg I plan to try to ride every descent, no matter how muddy or steep. They wouldn't put it on the course if it can't be ridden.

-Run appropriate tires. After the my experience during the warm up, I knew I was going to be at a dissadvantage with the tires I had. They were the very low knob, dusty hardpack tires I use back home in local races in Texas. They just weren't going to cut it in these conditions. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to change them before the race, and payed the price. I've been running my more aggressive Specialized Sauserwinds since my experience at Albstadt. They have bigger, more widely spaced knobs that will give me much more confidence when things get steep. All this week during training I've been able to rip descents at a whole new level.

This coming weekend is a Racer Bikes Cup (formerly Swiss Power Cup) in Engelberg, Switzerland. This race will likely be even bigger then the Albstadt. The course consists of 3.2 kilometers, straight up and straight down. We will do 8 laps. The forecast calls for at least 60% of rain the entire weekend... glad I have my new tires and game face put on!

This past week after Ablstadt I've been focusing on recovering and maintaining the excellent form I feel I have. Besides going on incredible rides here in the Black Forest, I've spent some time cruising through the little town of Kirchzarten. The other day, while Ryan, Skyler and I were eating lunch, we ran into Davis Phinney. He said he'd been clothes shopping with his wife and fellow cycling legend Connie Carpenter, when he saw the Team U.S.A. jerseys, and saw a much needed diversion. He remembered me from our previous meeting earlier this season, and said he was glad to see I was still climbing the ladder, so to speak.

Ordering lunch in Kirchzarten

My first pizza since late 2009. Boy it tasted good!

Ryan and Skyler happy

Davis Phinney and me in Kirchzarten

'Pro Bike' Inerview on Cyclingdirt.org

2010-06-11T09:37:00.000-07:00

Here's a 'Pro Bike" interview I did at the Mellow Johnny's Classic a few weeks ago with Colt McElwaine from CyclingDirt.org

http://www.cyclingdirt.org/videos/coverage/view_video/234969-pro-bike-season-one/340269-payson-mcelveen-pro-bike-specialized-

Today, two days before the race, is a day I typically take completely off. However, because of the tough travel the last couple days, I thought the legs needed a bit more action to be ready for the big race this Sunday. So I went out for a 45 minute spin/tour around town/bike shop scouting mission, with Seth Kemp and Jeremiah. I have some pics and a video I'll post up later.

The afternoon has been leisurely, first watching a good Dauphine stage and then a very exciting South Africa/Mexico World Cup game. Life is good.

Finally in Europe!

2010-06-10T07:51:00.001-07:00

Well, I am finally here. Although the travel was tough, I've finally made it to Kirchzarten Germany. Kirchzarten is in the middle of the famous Black Forest, and a few kilometers outside of Frieberg, a medium sized city. All around us are huge hills, or small mountains. Most of the area is dense old pine forest, while the hillsides are patched with the idylic European scenes most think of when talking about this area of the world. We are in a valley, with beautiful rivers and steams everywhere, and the black/green forested hills around us, punctuated by the green, green grazing meadows and occasional soft tinkle of far off dairy cow bells.

The housing itself couldn't be better either. It's a working farm/bed and breakfast type business with lots of rooms inside it's four stories. The rooms are unbelievable with at least 3 beds, kitchen, living area, big porch etc. The food situation couldn't be much better either: Daily markets can be found in Kirchzarten just a kilometer down the hill, and right outside the door, the farm has a small barn stocked with fresh eggs, veggies, milk etc. based on an honor system. ALL the bread here is the kind I love so much and look so hard to find in the U.S. I've never been a huge fan of Oatmeal or our version of muesli, but the musli they have over here is completely different... and I could eat it for breakfast the rest of my life. Mineral water is also huge here, and they literally have it on tap coming right out of the wall in some rooms.

Everything about Europe is different. On our 2.5 hour drive from the airport in the local pro teams team van, we got a nice tour of the road system. The roads are NARROW, and people drive ridiculously fast. On the 'Autobahn' there literally is no speed limit, meaning those lucky enough to own one of the many Audis or Ferraris can, well, take advantage of them. We were hauling along in our giant "Euro Van" at 140 K/H (85 mph), and getting passed by people going what seemed like twice as fast (some of them being logging trucks). All the roads are stupid skinny with the passing lane often 3meter wide. It is the sketchiest thing I've ever seen. People passing others at 110+ mph, with their mirrors an inch or two from the other car. One of the coaches has apparently already tapped another car with the mirror while trying to pass. There's also about 200 different traffic signs.

I started my 'travel day' when I woke up at around 8 o clock Austin time on the 8th and finished at around 9 o clock Kirchzarten time on the 9th. I wasn't able to sleep on the plane, meaning I went for more than 29 hours without sleep. Ouch. The actual travel was very smooth, just extremely long.

Yesterday, the 9th, when we got into Kirchzarten, we got the rundown on the place and then built our bikes. After that we headed out, lead by coach #1 and Fort Lewis College cycling coach, Matt Shriver, for a ride to blow all the junk out of our legs. By this point, I was in some kind of otherworldly place between being asleep and awake. I was saying weird things, thinking VERY slowly and not completely sure if I was asleep and dreaming or actually awake. We rode down to Frieberg, and along one street, simply turned off of pavement and onto singletrack. The trail went straight up a cliff with about 30 switchbacks that had us what seemed like a thousand feet above town in a matter of a few minutes. From there, we bombed down the dark and damp singletrack of the Black Forest, and eventually hit the Rostikoff, the only true downhill track in the area. Doing this on a 26 inch hardtail, at about hour 25 of being awake was pretty interesting.

The rest of the juniors here are all great. In all there are five us and we're all already really comfortable with each other and having fun. Matt Shriver is our main coach. He's super knowledgeable and easy to be around. Marc Gullickson will only be here for short time, but went on the road with us today, and proven that he hasn't lost all of his form from his racing days.

For today's ride, the plan was to go out for a couple hours, with some intensity mixed in to get the legs moving again. The two coaches (Matt and Marc) lead a ride with Ryan, Jeremiah and Skyler, while Seth and I went off to do our own thing. We both had rides planned that were a bit more structured than what the others were doing. Seth and I rode over to the 1995 World Championships course which is right outside of town and rode some super steep climbing and even steeper, fast descent. All the trail here so far is extremely smooth and the fastest I've ever ridden. Only some of the descents have any kind of occasional rocks or roots, but the steepness proves a plenty big challenge. After that, we split and did some of our own types of 'leg openers.' I did a lap of the very steep and climby yet untechnical World Champs course before hitting some bike path for a few sprints. After that, Seth and I joined back up and spun into town to look around.

Krichzarten is small, quaint and unbelievably 'EUROPE.' Lots of cobblestones, little farmers markets and tightly spaced 5+story houses.

Bike paths are EVERYWHERE, connecting all the towns. Everything is utterly immaculate, without a single cigarette butt or plastic bag.

The thing that has struck me most so far about this area of Europe at least, is that they've just got things figured out. All the roads are efficient, the cars are tiny and people healthy. About those cars, I basically have seen three types:Your typical car, which is what most folks have, on average about the size of a 'Smart Car," some are even smaller. Then you seen an unbelievable number of high end sports cars: Ferrari, Porches and especially Audis are everywhere. Lastly you have your shipping trucks, which is the equivalent of our Semis. These however are much smaller, and made by companies like Mercedes as well as lots of other companies I've never heard of.

There are people on bikes EVERYWHERE. What folks have said about more getting around by bike than by car is absolutely true. Along the twisty bike paths we rode yesterday, there were at least 5-10 riders within sight at any given point. You have everyone from your 75 year old grandmother making a grocery run, to fully kitted up XC racers and roadies. I believe just yesterday I saw over 50 folks in team kits on $5,000 plus XC race rigs. We borrowed the local XC pro team's bus for shuttling from the airport. The team is the Rothaus/Cube team and we got more than one cheer and thumbs up while waiting at stoplights etc. Even the small local XC team with only a few full time riders was recognized in towns went through on our way from the airport.

A funny thing that we were warned about by Matt, and have already experienced first hand, has to do with the size of the roads. They are SO small. You'll be riding along a bike path, and all of a sudden have a car coming in the other direction! We often can't differentiate between the bike paths and roads.

Today is Thursday, meaning we have three days until our first big race: Albstadt Bundislinga in central Germany. I'm already extremely excited/nervous. The body felt REALLY good today on my ride and I have all the time in the world to focus on the 'little things' in preparation. Living like a Pro ain't too bad so far!

Put this in my first cup of coffee ever... put it in my second cup of coffee ever also. Supporting the cause! Milram, that is.

Terrible picture, but this is an advertisement in the "Up in the Air" or equivalent magazine that's always on planes. This was advertising Adidas mountain bike sunglasses that Wolfram Kurschat and Irena Kalentieva wear. The sport's big in Europe.

Beer flavored pretzels? Really? Must be on a German airline.

Compression socks, Kinesio tape, legs up. Ready for a long flight.

Europe!

Here's a pic of a car making a pass on one of the 3 meter (6 ft.) wide Scary.

Team U.S.A. stuff. Jersys, bibs, gloves, socks, rainjacket, vests etc. Booya!!

Some of the '95 World Championships XC race course.

It is very easy to see where the Black Forest gets its name.

A view from today's trail.

Seth and me cruizin' through town.

Until next time...

Mellow Johnny's Classic ProXCT

2010-06-08T06:57:00.000-07:00

After a last, anticlimactic TMBRA race for the year at Rocky Hill, came the "A" priority Mellow Johnny's ProXCT National race.

First a quick word about Rockyhill:

For some reason, although physically ready, I mentally wasn't too hyped up about the race. I didn't not want to race, but I was just feeling indifferent... not a good enough mindset for a bike race.

Although I only did a half-hearted warm-up and wasn't my usual over-amped, excited self at the start line, once the race got started, I was able to "settle in at the office." The start was unusual in that we did one and a half shorter 'start loops' before heading onto the racecourse proper. Most of this start was jeep road climbing up, and then some tight singletrack down.

The pace was hot from the start, and I made sure to position myself towards the front. Over the course of the 10 minute start lap, racers one by one got popped off the back of the group. Although I was close to on my limit, I was able to stay with the leaders. At one point on a particularly steep climb, I accelerated to get around a slowing rider. I got out of the saddle to move around him, and felt what I thought was someone giving me a push from behind. When I looked back, there was no-one there. The acceleration of my back was so incredible, it had literally felt like I'd gotten a PUSH! Despite my completely maxed out effort at the time, I just couldn't stifle a breathless chuckle... man I love you Specialized. My bike is AWESOME!!

Anyways, the race went downhill for me from there. 15 minutes later, I put a massive slice in the sidewall of my tire. I threw a tube in... just to find out that my CO2 inflator was completely jammed. It was a very long walk back. So long in fact, that most of the of Pro/Cats beat me to the expo area! I must admit however, Rockyhill is a gorgeous place for a hike.

Mellow Johnny's:

Although I was disappointed with my Rockyhill race, I realized I had bigger fish to fry... very soon. The Mellow Johnny's ProXCT was doubling as the final TMBRA race of the season, as well as the 3rd race on the National ProXCT calindar. Because of this, I would be racing my age group (Cat 1 17-18), as some of the countries best junior would be making the trip. It is at these types of National races were you have the best opportunity to put yourself in plane view of USA Cycling.

Something else exciting that happened in the time between MJC and Rockyhill, is that I was able to reach an agreement with our Oakley representative. I'm very happy to announce that I will be using Oakley sunglasses the rest of my life!.. that's my plan at least. It's is no secret that Oakley's products really are head and shoulders above the others, and I have been wanting a pair of Radars since the time I first saw them! Luckily, that dream has come to wonderful fruition.

Back to MJs:

Because the course is only half an hour away from my house, I was able to practice and get very comfortable on it. In the days leading up to the race, I was confident, but also nervous.

Four of the six of us making the trip with USAC to Germany were registered. However, due to travel issues, one had to change his plans. Then, the unthinkable happened:

While on a training ride, Kevin Fish took a hard spill on the road, breaking an elbow, chipping teeth and putting a hole in his chin. All of a sudden, his plans for the season changed drastically. No Mellow Johnny's, No Europe and No Wisconsin. Not only did this mishap affect me because he's a teammate and increasingly close friend, but also because I know this is his last year as a junior, and how much he WANTS it. This was a REAL bummer to say the least.

So with these events taking place, it would only be two of us Euro team members toeing the line at MJC, plus a handful of local Junior Cat 1s, and a couple out of staters, plus the two time junior cyclorcoss National Champ, Jeff Bahnson. We'd raced against each other once before, at Nationals, where he beat me by 20 seconds.

The bigger competition however, would come from Seth Kemp. Last year he was the undisputed king of the U.S. Juniors, and is multi-time Super D and cross county national champ. He is also on the European team with me.

The day before the race I had a blast watching the Pros race and meandering around the Expo area. Colt from Cyclingdirt.org was on hand and we did a "ProBike" interview, which I will post when it's put on the website. The pre-ride was HOT, and that heat actually proved to be a real obstacle. More than anything, I realized that punching at an intensity too high, could blow you up for the rest of the day. Staying cool and pacing was going to be of extreme importance.

Race day came, and through the use of our paper thin Championsystem's Kits, tons of ice and even more ice water, I warmed up and made it to the start at a reasonable core temperature. At the start, a couple of the extra excited local boys (who wouldn't be excited at a National race?) took off. Soon Seth and I got around them, and we quickly opened up a gap on the rest of the field. I found myself riding comfortably and within myself on Seth's wheel, a HUGE change from what I was used to. Last time we raced, I'd finished the closest to him I ever had, at 6 minutes back! This time however, something was very different, although I wouldn't have wanted to go any faster, I wasn't riding outside of my ability. This was huge for my confidence. Unfortunately, he flatted around 20 minutes in. From that point on, I rode the rest of the race alone, and 'TTed' in for the win. I was so stoked. Second place, Jeff Bahnson, was 4.5 minutes back, and Seth finished third 7 minutes back, after some serious tire woes.

It felt so awesome to A) get my first win of the season and B) have it be a National race! It felt

pretty good standing up on the top step of that podium

So now, as I write this, I'm less than twenty minutes away from leaving to catch my plane to Europe. These next two weeks might just be the most exciting of my life so far...

Off to Euroland!

2010-06-02T16:51:00.000-07:00

Still playing catch up here...

I enjoy receiving emails. I just love it when I hear the little "BLING" sound, and a red icon pops up next to 'mail' in the toolbar. There are a few people who receiving mail from gets me most excited, such as my coach or teammates... or most of all Marc Gullickson at USA Cycling. I'd been waiting to receive a particularly special email from USA Cycling for quite a while. Ever since I sent in my application for the USA Cycling National Junior MTB team, I'd been waiting for that special email. 6 of the Nations top 17-18 year old mountain bikers are chosen each summer to travel over to Germany and Switzerald to race, train and gain experience against the toughest competition in the world. It is a big step in the journey to becoming a professional cyclist.

One day in mid April I came home from school, and checked my email as I always do. There were several that day, with even a couple from coach Christian. Then I saw it "European MTB Race Camp" from USA Cycling. I held my breath and read the first word: "Congratulations!"

I don't think I read anymore, I just ran outside to tell the rest of the family the news. I'm pretty sure I saw my dad's eyes welling up a bit as he hugged me. He knew how big a deal this was to me.

So, it's now early June, and only 6 days until I get on my first international flight... on my way to race in Europe. We'll be spending two weeks in Germany, and doing one race in Germany and one in Switzerland. It's going to be a heck of an experience.

Only a few days after I return, my dad and I will be traveling to Wisconsin, to participate in the Subaru Cup ProXCT- a very important selection race for both the Windham World Cup and The World Championships later in the year. Can't wait!!

A Tale of Two Podiums

2010-05-17T18:09:00.001-07:00

Wow it's been awhile since the last post... and it certainly hasn't been because of lack of material. Junior year in High School, training and racing have taken ALL my time lately.

Let's catch up, starting way back in early April...

Bar H- April 10-11

After Fontana my next race was Bar H, in Saint Jo Texas. The course always suits me, as it has quite a bit of climbing in comparison to the rest of the TMBRA courses. In the weeks leading up to the race, there was quite a bit of hype about the new 'real mountain bikers' course... as opposed the the partially mountain bikers course in previous years? Whatever. Instead of 3 shorter laps, we'd be doing 2 longer ones. Also, the total climbing had nearly been doubled. Because of my misfortune at Fontana, I was extra motivated to have good race. After pre-riding I could tell it was going to be a 'tough-man's' race: Steep climb after steep climb had you on the limit from start to finish. Even the descents were extremely physical and demanded lots of concentration.

One of my goals for the race was to make the front group right from the gun. Most of the time in races I find myself getting a bad start, and being forced to play catch-up the whole race. Unfortunately, right at the gun I slipped my pedal not once, but twice, resulting in me entering the singletrack well out of the top 10. Luckily a jeep road section allowed me to pass most of the riders in front of me, and I was able to latch onto the back of the lead group. I bridged across solo to the leaders fairly easily, which was my first clue that I had good legs for the day. After cresting the first big climb of the course comfortably in the lead group of 4-5, a stick suddenly got lodged between my rotor and brake pad. It completely stopped the wheel, forcing me to pull off and take the wheel out. The issue only took 20-30 seconds to resolve, but it put me in second to last place, right at the beginning of some of the tightest part of the singletrack. Alas, I'd be playing catch up again!

For the rest of the race I went to work picking off rider after rider, until finally, with only a few miles to go, I caught 3rd and 4th place. With about a mile to go, I put in a big effort and managed to drop the two riders, putting me in a podium position. Suddenly I realized that 2nd place only had around 20 second advantage on me, and I put my head down and went after him. I caught the rider right as we entered the final straightaway, but was unable to come around him in the sprint. I was still ecstatic with my first podium finish in a Pro race.

Pic thanks to Ian Fleming

Double Lake- May 1-2

The TMRBA Solavaca Cat Claw Classic was next on my racing schedule, but I unfortunately came down with a cold on the Friday before the race. I couldn't believe that yet again, I was being sidelined. Looking back I realized that since January of this year, I've been sick 3 times, and had 2 serious knee injuries. It has definitely NOT been a completely smooth early season!

Because I missed Solavaca, I decided to race the TMBRA Double Lake race in Houston, one that we had planned on skipping.

This course we basically on the other end of the spectrum in comparison to the Bar H course. With an elevation gain of no more that a couple hundred feet per lap, and a hardpacked smooth surface, "The Big Ring Challenge" is the fastest course on the TMBRA circuit. We end up covering 32 miles in a little over 2 hours... in comparison to Bar H's 22 miles in 2 hours.

At the start I once again bobbled clipping into my pedal, but was able to regain a good position in the long start stretch. Right as we entered the singletrack, 3 riders hit the deck, slingshoting me into 3rd place, right on Bryan Fawley's wheel. Riding in his characteristically aggressive style, Bryan attacked the course, with Tristan Uhl and I clinging to his wheel. We opened up a huge margin almost immediately, and coming through the start finish, had a lead over 2 minutes on the rest of the field. It was a dream scenario for me: I was in the small lead group, amazed that I was at the front of the race with two of my heroes. Unfortunately I couldn't hold Bryan's unrelenting pace, and I soon let them go. The remaining 24 miles proved to be a turning point in my racing. Completely isolated, I had to push myself, Time Trial style, hoping to hold off a hard charging Rick Wetherald behind. Despite my energy really running ragged in the last 15 minutes of the race, I managed to preserve my 3rd place position, landing me on the podium for the 2nd race in a row!

You can see me in the black with red helmet. 30 yards from the singletrack, and I wasn't in very good position.

But right as we were entering the twisties, riders started going down. Here, Scott Henry lost a front wheel and is about to make friends with mother earth. Those of us on the inside of the turn (Fawley, Tristan and I) snuck through.

Alone for 24 miles. Ouch.

Next up was the Rocky Hill race in Smithville...

Fontana (The clever 'Fontucky' title has kinda been worn out)

2010-04-13T19:08:00.000-07:00

Well I never did get a Fontana race report up. You'd think of all the boring things I find time to write about I'd be able to find some time to write about the first National level mountain bike race of the year. Apparently not. This past weekend I had an excellent TMBRA race at Bar H, but first I'll do a quick recap of Fontana just to fill y'all in.

Fontana:

The race didn't go well. Although the trip proved to be a blast, the actual race was definitely a let down.

This was my first trip to Cali, and was a blast. We stayed in a super plush hotel, and had a nice relaxed couple of days before the race. Besides enduring a midnight flight just a couple days before the race, my preparation couldn't have been much better. Teammate and friend Kevin Fish and I pre-rode the super sweet racecourse the day before. We both decided it was one of the raddest we'd seen. Tough, steep, fast and flowy... unfortunately, neither of our races turned out to be any of those.

On the start line we were informed that our race had been shortened from around 19 miles, to around 13. Typically, the second hour in a XC race is my best and where I make up ground, so I was less than stoked to here we'd be doing a one hour race.

5 minutes in Kevin flatted and was forced to DNF. That. Sucks.

The first two laps for me were a nightmare. My body didn't seem ready to race, and I found myself floundering in the teens (our field had over 25 entrants by the way). Finally, on the third and final lap, completely confused at this point, my body woke up and I turned a blazing fast lap. With 3/4 of a mile to go I had scrounged my way up to 5th place's wheel, and was looking at possibly salvaging something of my race and grabbing a podium spot. Alas, it wasn't meant to be: Right about the time I was getting ready to attack and make an attempt at grabbing my spot on the box, a 30 yard piece of course tape, blown across the trail got sucked up and wound around my cassette, completely jamming the drivetrain. Unable to yank it out, I was forced to run with my bike the remaining 3/4 mile, getting passed by 2 other racers in the process... landing me in an uninspiring 8th place. Damn.

I can't begin to explain how frustrating it is to put so much commitment into 1 hr., and have it be ruined by something as frivilous as a piece of course tape. Luckily, their are more of these big races coming this year... lots more. Here are some pics from the trip:

My first impression of California

The course was pretty awesome, with plenty of areas to earn a trip to the hospital/ or gain some time. Willow was shredding this section faster than most of the Pro Men.

Lene Byberg of Specialized Factory Racing won the woman's race in dominating fashion. Pretty cool to see this legend of the World Cup circuit racing in person.

Here's my picture of the sprint finish that decided the men's race. Fail.

Todd Wells of Specialized Factory Racing took the win, making it a double win day for team Specialized!!

The oh-so-exciting landscape of El Paso. Luckily I didn't have to get out of the plane.

Maybe I'll write a Bar H race report in the next few days? It happened a while ago, but was a bit of a significant event. Oh, and I have some REALLY big, exciting news coming up soon also. Until then...

'Body Geometry' and more tight fitting clothing

2010-03-24T14:00:00.000-07:00

Lately, as well as doing my regular training on the mountain and road bike, I have been taking some steps off the bike to improve my performance. First and foremost, I finally got a proper bike fit. This is something I've been wanting to do for a while now, but financial constraints had prevented me from being able to get one. Recently however Sean Ahmadi, a teammate and good friend, offered to come to the rescue. Thanks to his generosity I was able to get both my mountain race bike, and my road bike as close together in terms of geometry as possible. As I had been afraid of, I did have some fairly quirky things going on with the biomechanics of my cycling. For example, we found that I pedaled with my left heel out at an angle, robbing me of power and creating an imbalance in my pedaling action. We fixed this problem using some of Specialized's 'Body Geometry' technology. Biomechanics on a bicycle is possibly the single most undervalued component of being a successful racer. Hardly any cycling companies have acknowledged this fact, and even fewer have done something about it. Specialized, however, has seen the value and extreme importance in it, and together with the help of Dr. Andy Pruitt, developed BG Fit, or Body Geometry. Body Geometry is basically a series of approaches, technologies and products that address where your body meets the bike: Butt, feet and hands.

Here are a couple really neat videos about Body Geometry: Video #1 Video #2

So to remedy some of my bike fitting issues, we utilized Body Geometry.

The picture above (sorry about the poor quality) shows some of the things that fixed my fitting issues and efficiency on the bike. The shoes are the Specialized S-Works top of the line mountain bike race shoes. They are basically identical to last year's road model, with a few modifications such as a small tread for when you're forced off the bike. Not only are these the most comfortable shoes I have ever had the pleasure to race in, they are also by far the stiffest and most efficient.

The green BG Fit 'Foot bed' is a specially designed insole with various modifications to better fit a riders unique needs. In my case, my feet pronate badly, so I use the most aggressive arch support insole. You can choose from three different insole designs based on your needs. On the far right of the picture are BG Fit shims, which also go inside the shoe. These tilt the foot as needed, to correct imperfections in one's foot alignment.

After we determined what I needed and applied them to the shoe, I immediately noticed huge improvement. Not only was I even more comfortable, but I I could visually see how it changed my biomechanics. Before using the footbeds and shims, my knees dove in towards the top tube at the bottom of my pedal stroke. With the application of these new shoes, footbeds and shims, that was completely nullified, and I now have a near perfect, piston like and powerful pedal stroke.

Another thing I recently invested in were some 2xU compression socks. Compression clothing has long been out on the market, but seems to be gaining popularity lately. After doing some research, I decided to drop $45 and get a pair. I can't say that they're making me faster, but they do feel good. After spending a good 8-10 hours in airplane seats the last weekend, I can tell you me legs and feet felt less heavy and swollen when I finally was able to get up and move around again. This is an ongoing experiment, and I'll keep y'all posted.

Yet another reason to make the 'style police' scorn the cycling world

(Dis)Comfort

2010-03-14T16:43:00.000-07:00

Today was the Comfort XC race and second race of my season. I feel like I have been getting stronger the last couple weeks, so I was looking forward to asserting that with a good result today. Unfortunately it wasn't meant to be. I was caught up in a 3 rider pileup that occurred roughly 4 pedal strokes into the race. I was (mostly) unhurt, as were the others, but unlike thse others, my bike was too damaged to continue racing. I jumped up ready to go, when I found my front wheel tacoed pretty nicely, and saddle nicely crunched... and with that, I stepped under the tape and off the course as I watched the 30 other Pro/Cat 1s disappear up the trail. I stood there in disbelief for a few seconds, before Christian Smith, fastest woman in Texas and my previous coach, yelled at me to grab a bike from the Specialized Demo Trailer. Something clicked in my head, and a whole bunch of stuff happened at once. Tobin told me to just grab his bike from 'over there' and pointed to the 30 0r so bike leaning and lying around, so I quickly made a decision to get a bike from the demo fleet instead.

A Specialized rep had driven a big trailer down with 30 or so top of the line bikes, from a Demo 8 World Cup DH bike, to an S-Works Transition TT bike and everything in between. My luck couldn't have been better. Despite my less than polite frenzy, the Specialized representative saw my plight, and quickly grabbed an Epic from the rack. He efficiently and thoughtfully began putting the correct air pressure in the fork and rear shock, while I paced around too juiced up be of any kind of help. Despite 3 or 4 people working as quickly as they could to help get me back on the course, there were still waivers to sign and all kinds of things for the bike to be ready. When it was all said and done, I went sprinting back onto the course on an unfamiliar bike and the saddle not quite high enough... a mere 10 or 15 minutes after my group took off... not ideal. After having to stop 5 minutes in, to make a saddle height adjustment, I finally got rolling for real. Thinking realistically, I set a goal of catching all the Cat 1 Juniors (who started an unknown amount of time ahead of me), and simply getting in a good hard training ride.

For the first lap, I was able to make the most of the situation, and rode hard, despite the unfamiliar geometry driving my arms and back mad. On the second lap I began to lose a bit of focus, but was able to regroup for the last 30 minutes or so and push to the end.

When it was all said and done I had gotten in a pretty good workout, but was still super bummed out. This race was really going to serve as a reference point of my fitness going into the first big race of the year in two weeks at Fontana. When I sat down a minute, and let the last crazy two hours sink in, I realized how fortunate I'd been. Crashes happen, bad luck happens, and 99% of the time I simply would have been out of luck. The fact that the Specialized demo crew were there and willing to just loan me a bike so that I could race, no questions asked, was a true blessing... not to mention the fact that the bike that they just happened to have available was the 2008 world championships winning machine! Not a bad deal!

I took a few things away from this experience:

A) Racing on a borrowed bike you've never ridden before isn't a great idea... but it's a heck of a lot better than nothing. Thank you Specialized!

B) Full Suspension simply isn't my preference. The Specialized S-Works Epic is one of the fastest full suspension race bikes on the planet. That said, I am one of the few on the planet who prefer a good ol' fashioned hardtail. That said, I did enjoy blasting through rock gardens care free, letting the suspension compensate for any errors I made.

C) Will Rader and I should never line up next to each other again. It seems like whenever we do, we end up on the ground together before we even get started. It's not really either of our faults, it just happens. I think he will agree.

D) Few things are more valuable in the world than human kindness and just an attitude to want to help. Tobin, Christina and Specialized, thank you for helping make a bad situation into a good one.

I now have the equivalent of 3 weeks off of school, so I should be able to prepare well this next couple of weeks to do well at Fontana... and prove I deserve to be on that USA Cycling European team!

Interview in the 'Racing Post'

2010-03-06T18:17:00.001-08:00

Most of you probably know of The Racing Post. For those that don't, it's basically the statewide bicycle and triathlon racing magazine of Texas and Oklahoma. Articles, interviews, race reports and tech reviews are all published monthly, with almost all of the content written by racers. At the beginning of this year, I was also approached about writing a monthly column in the magazine, and now enjoy doing just that.

This past issue, although not containing a column by me, does feature an interview with me, or a 'Junior Spotlight' as it's commonly referred to.

Here's the link to this months issue, with my interview on pages 28-29, however there are excellent stories and articles throughout: http://www.theracingpost.us/images/Issues/Mar%202010%20mag%20SO%20.pdf

Warda Race Report

2010-03-03T15:38:00.000-08:00

This past Sunday was Warda, the first real race of my 2010 season. I'm proud to say that it looks like we're off to a good start. In the days leading up to the race, I was really wondering what kind of shape I would be in, and how I would finish. Already this year I've had several pretty serious setbacks, mostly in the form of injuries, but also have been training well with the same dedication as usual, along with some new methods. Basically, I figured I'd be somewhere between 5th and be in very good early season shape, or finish out of the top 15 and have to go back to the drawing board.

The Warda course is one of my favorites: Extremely fast, flowy, punchy and just a blast to... well, blast! Luckily we were blessed with a rare day of sunshine and warmer temperatures and the trail was in about as perfect condition as possible.

As a whole, the race itself went pretty well for me. Unfortunately, I had an absolute disaster of a start. The race to the singletrack seemed pretty chilled out to me, and I didn't struggle at all to be top five in our group of 25 (this was my first indication that I was in pretty good shape), but didn't want to get too excited and ruin my whole race in the first 30 secs. Unfortunately for me, about 50 yards before the singletrack, half the field behind me decided to get sneaky (read: 'dirty'), and sort of, cut across this big sweeping grass turn. To their credit, this section wasn't marked ridiculously well, but the point was I found my good top five position turn into a nightmarish top 20 start position. Stranded, and unable to pass in the tight and twisty singletrack, the leaders proceeded to put 1:00 plus on me less than 15 minutes into the race. Once we finally did break out of the singletrack, I was astonished to find my top end power lightyears ahead of what it was a few months ago, and I was able to put it into top gear and get myself back into the top 10 within a few moments. After making up for my less than stellar start, I went to work trying to close down the gap that had formed, and catch as many racers as I could.

Each lap I would catch one or two more folks ahead of me, as they were spit out of the big 'lead' group of 7 or so racers, who were in fact trying to chase down a very impressive Scott Henry (he ended up winning by well over 2 minutes).

Long story short, I was able to catch 6th place with under half a minute left in the race, and pulled a super sneaky inside pass on a tight corner to lead into the not so sprint friendly final straightaway. I ended up grabbing 6th place by a hair-raising margin of 2 seconds, and was very happy to find 3 or 4 racers at the finish doubled over their bars apparently having finished only a few seconds ahead of me.

Although the actual numerical result wasn't overly exciting, I was just seconds off the lead group, and apparently closing with every lap. Who knows, maybe if I decide to stick my elbows out a bit more at the start I could be fighting for the win in a couple weeks?... As long as Scott Henry doesn't show up. On a side note, Scott had raced a 6 hour solo MTB race the day before in Arkansas, arrived at Warda at 3:30 a.m. race morning, and then beat me by 3 minutes... ouch.

Made 95 green ones, which was nice. Now should I put it toward some new 4Ti Crank Bros. eggbeaters ($220), compression socks ($40), Oakley Radars ($200+), A Retül Bike fit ($350), pay some of my debt back for the PowerTap (at least $100 more), or put it towards a plane flight to Germany (at least $700)?

The rest of Team Bicycle Sport Shop didn't do too shabby either, with Matt Gordon finishing 2nd, Brian Kuehl in 10th, and strong showings and good starts to the season for our other Pro/Cat 1 racers. Freddy Moore was 3rd in Cat 1 40-49 and Chris Campbell 4th. Mason Shea in his first Cat 1 junior race finished 3rd.

Here's a wonderfully flattering picture of me that close friend Ian Fleming took... and of course felt the need to post on the General Texas racing forum that 1000s of people read. Sweet. Had to do a bit of explaining on this one. No, I am not in serious pain... well, actually I am, just my facial expression is not actually what's portraying this. I am, in fact, yawning. Don't ask me why. I saw Ian with camera in hand out of the corner of my eye and tried to get my mouth shut and look decent before he hit the button, but apparently he beat me to the draw. Oh well. No, we didn't buy this one, thus the water mark. If I'm breaking some serious trademark regulations here, let me know Ian so I can remove it. Otherwise thanks for the 'inspiring' picture.

Yep, it's finally here...

2010-02-27T09:59:00.000-08:00

...the 2010 race season that is. Tomorrow both the 2010 TMBRA Spring Series, and my 2010 mountain bike race season will kick off. It's been a nice off season and pre-season what with cyclocross, road races, Dirt Derbies, new equipment and broken knees... but it's now time to for the real show to begin.

Since I got back on the bike after what turned out to be three weeks off (thanks to a 'sick, left knee injury, sick, right knee injury' sequence), I've been playing a bit of catch up. At this point I think I'm about back to where I was, or maybe even ahead, in terms of racing form before my little detour... but I have no idea what that means in comparison to everyone else. Even without injuries it's been a rough winter for Texas cyclists as it's either been 30º, raining, snowing, or any combination of those, making training outside tough.

Tomorrow is Warda, the season opener, as well as one of my favorite courses on the TMBRA circuit. The first race of the season is always a huge unknown, as most participating will not have done a proper XC race since October or November, and may or may not have been 'training' the way they're supposed to. I have no idea what to expect of myself, and wouldn't be surprised if I struggle and finish midpack or lower, but also wouldn't be surprised if I'm able to take advantage of some "procrastinators" and find myself at the front fighting for the win. At about this time tomorrow we'll know the answer.

After Warda I'll have 4 weeks to do some good hard training before my first real big race of the season, the Fontana ProXCT National Series race out side of L.A. The weekend before that I'll be doing another local TMBRA race in Comfort. We will be treating all the TMBRAs this year mostly as 'good training races we wouldn't mind doing well in', and the National races like Fontana as A priority races. Last year at the Comfort Omnium I had my best finish at a local Pro race, grabbing second place.

Along with new bikes and bigger races and goals for 2010, other changes will include the discontinuation of this blog... in exchange for something tons better. A friend of mine is helping out with the construction of a for real, big time website for me. We are still in the very early stages, but I am already way excited and can't wait for it to get launched. To give you an idea of what it might look like, check out Sam and Andy Schultz's website here: http://www.schultzbrothersracing.com/

So far we're still in the early designing stages. I'm thinking I want a green and purple color scheme (somewhat similar to what the blog looks like now), but an not sure about the exact colors. I'd like all the input I can get, so let me know the number of the colors you think would work best, as a comment below. It'll mostly green and purple on a black backgound, at least that's my thinking for now...

In other news, the march issue of 'The Racing Post' should be out any day, with my interview in it. I'll post a link when it's up.

Picked these bad boys up a couple weeks ago. Still haven't used them. Anyone feel like donating some $$ so I can get a bike fit so I can use these? He he...

Thanks for reading, and be expecting a Warda race report soon...

All State

2010-01-23T19:30:00.000-08:00

The other day the coach of our track program at school came up to me at lunch and handed me an envelope. This was inside:

A nice little certificate

A little felt patch for my imaginary letterman jacket

Apparently I was Academic All State this year. Not really sure what that means though. I believe it's something along the lines of top 10% of our class academically, and then top 5 at State Championships in some sport (in my case cross-country running.) I don't think that's exactly right, but have heard that it looks good on a college application. Yay.

In other news: My knee is still bothering me. After my left subluxed knee recovered, I immediately got tendonitis in the right one. We have discovered that it's not actually tendonitis, but Chondromalacia, which is basically an irritation between the back of the patella and where it interfaces with the knee joint. It doesn't seem to be getting any better or any worse. It is uncomfortable when I ride, but not overly painful. Training has been put completely on hold for way too long now. If anyone knows anything about Chondromalacia and how to recover from it, PLEASE let me know. I'm ready get on with my life.

It's been a rough week

2010-01-18T18:31:00.001-08:00

Yep, it's been a rough week. The other day while playing basketball at recess, the unthinkable happened. We had yet ANOTHER left patella incident.

I've dislocated it twice, once in 7th grade whilst playing good ol' touch football... ahh the memories. And then again in 9th grade during a basketball game. Both times took over a month of physical therapy and happened in the month of January. This meant taking a good month off for slow and fairly intense rehab right when I was starting to ramp things up. For a fired up and motivated athlete, there is nothing more frustrating than a time consuming and season halting injury. Needless to say, early last week, when I went up to get a rebound during a fun but competitive game of basketball at recess, and got hit... and felt that gut wrenching sensation that I had felt so many times, I was ready to cry. Not at all because it hurt, but because of what it might mean. As soon as I felt that awkward sensation of bone on bone in a place I shouldn't be feeling it, all kinds of thoughts went through my head. My season is over. We said we'd get surgery if this happened again; my season is over.

As soon as I hit the ground though, sitting down, with my kneecap where it was supposed to be, I knew everything was going to be alright. Thirty seconds later, and I still wasn't feeling the dull, mind-numbing ache that usually ensues after a dislocation.

Turns out I had simply gotten very, very lucky, and only received a VERY strong warning. It had only subluxed and not fully dislocated. Turned out that just 5 days of ice and a bit of rehab was in store, and I was good as new... well sort of. The truth is, that kneecap is so incredibly unstable now, I'll either need to get surgery at the end of this season, or never play any contact sport again... and never fall off my bike. I have a feeling I know which route we're going to take...

Some good old Kinesio tape does wonders. Thanks Ginie!

No, the electrical cord doesn't have any deep metaphorical meaning... sorry.

By about day three of my knee keeping me off the bike, I was getting a bit stir-crazy and worrying about how much fitness I was going to lose. Right about the time I started thinking I might just go ahead and get back on the bike even if my knee wasn't quite ready, I got a vicious cold. No throwing up, and not even too severe of a fever, but just completely bone dry in the gas tank. I think I slept about 20 hours of Thursday. Just now as I write I've finally been able to get rid of the handkerchief in my pocket and my knee is ready to be used again... as long as it's bicycle based.

Well now I guess I'll just have a 45 minute study hall instead of recess everyday! Which I'm thinking may be a better thing in the long run. More time to train!

One thing we may want to note is that I was planning on racing the cyclocross state championships last weekend, but decided it would probably be not such a great idea to go jumping around over hurdles, in the mud, in tiny little plastic shoes, with a bike on my back; considering the fact that at that point my patella would probably go out if I simply stood in the wind at the wrong angle.

Big Bend Winter Training Camp

2010-01-11T16:56:00.000-08:00

The concept of an early season winter training camp is not new, but it seems to be gaining more momentum lately, and not just for the big Pro teams.

Last year, the McElveens and our good friends the Flemings headed out to Big Bend in search of a week of good weather, amazing trails... and mountains! After having such a blast of a time last year, we planned a Terlingua Winter Training Camp 2.0 for this year. Unfortunately only the "hardcore racers" of the two families would make the trip this time, those being Eric, John and Luke, and Pa and Me. We met up with good friends Ginie Webber and Jamie Mitchell while out there as well, and shared this cute casita.

Miraculously, this little beauty is under $40 a night, with three beds, plenty of floor space for a cot, the wonderful little porch to the right, running water, fridge, outhouse etc. It was a perfect home base.

The plan basically consisted of getting in lots and lots of FUN base miles... and did we ever.

On day one, we climbed the Basin Climb in Big Bend National Park. It's about 5 miles up, and gains a little under 2,000 feet I believe. I toted my road bike and PowerTap all the way out there just for one time trial up the beast... and of course accidentally deleted the ride moments after finishing. Brilliant! I broke my time from last year by over 5 minutes though!

The days after this only "serious" day, consisted of long, epic rides on the dirt roads and singletrack that wind through this incredible, largely untouched landscape.

We received some absolutely invaluable and wonderful guiding help from the good-folks at Desert Sports for a couple of rides.

Here is some of the rippin' fast singletrack that characterizes the the Airport Loop. This was part of the late Mas o' Menos race course.

My main training partner was Eric Fleming. We race Pro/Cat 1 locally together, and he is my closest racing friend. We will be traveling together for many of the National, and possibly International races I do this season. We couldn't help but get competitive in the fast singletrack and whenever the road/trail turned up. Good times.

I lied. I said I only did one real serious tough training effort( the Basin Climb), but Eric and I also did a time trial effort of the race loop, towards the end of our stay. I beat me previous time by 8+ minutes, for the one hour loop, and averaged over 16 miles per hour. Like I said: IT'S FAST!!!

Every evening we were treated to beautiful sunsets over the mountains. And every morning incredible sun rises. It's an absolutely breathtaking area.

Each evening, recovering became more and more important in order to get as much out of the next day as we could. After about the 3rd day of 4 + hour epic rides, the miles began to catch up with us. Here Luke demonstrates the self massage foam roller we used each night. Torture to some sections of our Lactic Acid saturated muscles, but insured the next day we'd have fresher legs.

We realized one day that for some reason none of us had ever learned how to hula-hoop. We fixed that with this homemade one we found in the casita. Here Luke is hoopin' and sporting my racing shades... hmmmm.

Behind "Desert Sports" is hidden the spectacle that is "Miracle Mile". It is just that: One miraculous mile of singletrack. We agreed it was possibly the most fun we'd had in our entire life. Stupid fast, with jumps, flowy turns, "stomach in your mouth" drops and whoops, that had MASSIVE penalty points. SWEET!! We did countless laps... and not at exactly what you might call "base building pace."

Our last ride of the trip was on the Contrabando/Fresno Creek Trail. It was one of the most memorable rides of my life. This hill is one massive mound of Quartz crystals. You have to see it to believe it.

Big Bend is famous for it's incredible geology.

Lunch in the dry Fresno creekbed. The fellow in front is Mike Long from Desert Sports. Yes the Mike Long that put on the wonderful Chihuahua Desert Challenge, and then later Mas o' Menos mountain bike races. Mas o' Menos was just recently taken from us by land access issues, but Mike is already working on something exciting and completely new. Mike was our guide on a few of our rides, and one of the neatest, down-to-earth people you'll ever come across. His knowledge of the desert is amazing, and respect for it a true model for others. Drop by Desert Sports sometime and say hi to the folks there. Very special people, providing very special opportunities, in a very special place.

Further down Fresno Creek and things started to really get interesting. Moab in Texas. Now THIS was fun.

This little motte of grass I found in the creek bed was the first I'd seen in nearly a week. My shins and forearms started to get tired of the desert vegetation. EVERTHING in the desert has thorns.

As we picked our way down Fresno Creek, lots of little side canyons such as this one were just begging you to come explore up them, but there was tons more fun to be had further down. And we have to save something for next year!

Just when you think you're finally going to have to get off the bike, a line presents itself. As you can tell from the water left by our treads, it was up and over this rock. Some moves were pretty sketchy, and definitely required pulling out some trials moves, but incredibly the ENTIRE thing is ridable. Unless of course the creek is running like it usually is.

Stunning. And yes, there's a line off to the left... but only barely.

All in all, it was one darn successful trip, and I can't wait until next year!

When you clean your room...

2009-12-30T18:21:00.000-08:00

... you often find some long forgotten items, or maybe ones you didn't even know you had! I was so excited when I cleaned my room the other day, and as a result, found my long lost USADA special edition folding toothbrush. Yes!!

Action mode

It conveniently folds to an economical 4"x 1"x 1/2" dimension. USADA also generously provides their website and phone number, in case you ever get antsy... while brushing your teeth, and want some blood drawn, or to pee in a cup.

Anyone want it?

Oh, and in case you were wondering, USADA doesn't hand out souvenirs at doping control, but apparently do at seminars.

I am not making fun of USADA in the least. They do very, very hard, often thankless work... and do it well. USADA, keep it up... we can win this battle. Even if your souvenirs are a bit odd.

Christmas

2009-12-27T17:46:00.000-08:00

Christmas is one of my favorite days of the year, maybe second only to "race day". There's something about getting up (yep, still painfully early), to open presents as a family around the tree and woodstove, that just never seems to lose it's excitement. It's a difficult feeling to describe, but luckily I don't have to since I'm sure most of y'all feel the same way on this day each year.

Thanks to a bit of success in the few races I did this off season, I was able to afford some presents for the family. To me, giving feels even better than receiving, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited to see what on my (embarrassingly cycling exclusive) Christmas list I'd be fortunate enough to receive. At the top of the list was a "round trip airfare to Germany", for the USA Cycling Junior camp in June 2010.

My family and I have come to the conclusion more or less: "that I'm damn lucky to get all the support I get for racing that I do", and so "don't expect much else." I'm happy that I've found peace with this concept, because it really is true.

However, this year, I did receive some AWESOME gifts, as well as very practical ones, even if they weren't big, super expensive... or made out of carbon fiber. I already have that thanks to BSS. Case in point of the above statement, about support. Ahem... BSS Rocks!!! Anyway, here are some highlights:

In contention for my favorite gift of the year was this Specialized Factory Team thermal race jacket. Not just any jacket though, this one was actually used by Todd Wells during this past cyclocross season. Colt at CyclingDirt.org had a "Pick and Win" contest of Cross Nats this year, and "stole" various prizes from some Pros. Go to CyclingDirt.org and check out Colt's "Breaking and Entering" video series, where he got these prizes. They're pretty funny and creative. I was stoked when I got a package in the mail from CyclingDirt.org, my favorite site on the internet.

I'm a big fan of Todd Well's and the whole Specialized Factory mountain bike team. There's only a few brands of bikes I'd really be happy to race, and be on the team of, and Specialized is definitely one of them. Maybe one day soon I'll own a bunch of these jackets of my own... that I didn't have to win to get.

In close contention for best gift, along with the Todd Wells jacket, is this Lance Armstrong Comeback 2.0 book. It just recently came out, and is all the rage. And for good reason. This compilation of photos taken by Liz Kreutz and captioned by the man himself is stunning, inspiring and gripping. It is a portal into the life of this champion that maybe goes deeper than anything before it. Lance seems to have opened himself up to world quite a bit more, as he explains in the foreward. Most of y'all probably know that Lance is, and has been for awhile, my hero. I've compiled a pretty sizable collection of books, magazine articles, and race and interview footage of him over the years, and he remains to this day my single biggest inspiration to continue to GO FOR IT. I've studied him so much, that when I finally met him personally and spent some time with him recently, I felt as if we already knew each other well. Although that still isn't the case yet, things these days are looking like they may be headed in that direction. We shall see.

I recently started shaving my legs in true bike racer fashion, much to the relief of my fellow racers, and chagrin of my school friends and family. However, even if they do disapprove of it, they were still kind enough to spend a little money and make this part of my life easier. It's sped up daily shaving time by ten. Lovin' it.

The Pups were very happy to find that Santa had visited their stockings as well.

With full stomaches and the usual long day of presents and visits by the extended family, everyone was tired. Yampa fell asleep watching us play Scrabble, with his head resting on the kitchen table.

Now I've got to study this "Racing Weight" book I got so I can work all these Christmas calories off before the next race. Still got a little while...

Yes, I'm still alive

2009-12-23T07:25:00.001-08:00

Wow it's been awhile, just about exactly one month since I updated last!

Not a whole lot has happened since the Mellow Johnny's Classic in terms of racing, but some borderline interesting tid bits on the non-racing side.

Soon after the Mellow Johnny's Classic, I got the "real" training ball rolling. The PowerMeter has made training life very different, and I feel that in only 3 or 4 weeks I've progressed hugely. As I tweeted not too long ago: "I'm looking forward trying out my new PowerMeter created form on some folks this coming season." Although I trained with a huge amount of desire and drive last year, sometimes the consistency or methodical scientific side of things was lacking a bit. If I can put those two together this year, I think very good things are going to happen.

Today is Wednesday, I think, and the fact that I'm already not sure about the date means I'm having nice relaxed vacation from school. A few days after Christmas, the McElveens (only Pa and me this time), and the Flemings (Eric, John and Luke) are going to meet up in Big Bend for a training camp. We did this last year and had a complete blast. For a week we put in huge miles of both mountainous road riding, and ripping singletrack down in the desert... it is going to be amazing.

After doing some form of racing most every weekend last month, I have a pretty good break here for a little while. My next race won't be until January 16 and 17 when I'll do the State Cyclocross Championships. The Age-Based is on Saturday (I'll be racing Junior 17-18 I think) and the category based on Sunday. Due to the fact that I've only done a handful of CX races, I'll be racing Cat 4. I look forward to seeing if I can bring home a couple jerseys while racing a Mountain Bike. I'm sure that would piss some people off, which is always fun!

Soon after that I'll be lining up for the Comfort Marathon, which is a track that seems to always be good to me. Word is Lance may be lining up also.

After some drama surrounding the fate of the 2010 ProXCT series, USA Cycling looks like they've stepped in, and my National racing schedule shouldn't be affected. Fontana is in late March, but I'm already getting excited.

You tend to do strange, often questionable things when you have extra time on your hands, or at least I do. When you find an old, unusable CO2 canister, of course the first thing you think of is to blow it up! Kids, don't do it. After about 5 minutes of whacking it with 1) a shovel 2) a baseball bat 3) a sledge hammer and then finally 4) a good ol' fashioned pick axe.... I got the thing to explode. Yes it was incredibly loud, yes I got sprayed in the face with small shards of metal ( I had safety glasses on), and yes I got yelled at. After it was all said and done, it was only mildly worth it.

Payson

Mellow Johnny's Classic (Or, an anticlimactic end to my off season)

2009-11-26T13:05:00.000-08:00

Last weekend was, among other things, the Mellow Johnny's Classic, Lance Race, Dripping Springs Race, or whatever you want to call it. Since I heard about the event, I had looked forward to it, but more because of the Big Time atmosphere I was sure would be present, rather than the racing itself. I knew all too well that my not-so-in-shape-ness would be rudely greeted by the semi to very-inshape-ness of most of the other 60 some Pros I'd be racing. The event lived up to everything I'd hoped it would, except for the actual race part of it... for me at least.

Big name industry folk were there with their big time demo booths etc. most notably the SRAM crew, who were out to make there new SRAM XX cross country mountain bike group look good.

Not only were there big fields, but big names in the big fields. I would be up against 60 other Pro racers, including the usual hot shots of: Scott Henry, Bryan Fawley and Matt Gordon. However, some others decided to make the trip: Dave Weins (6 time Leadville winner and both Lance Armstong and Floyd Landis slayer), Len Zanni (Big name pro from Colorado), JHK (Olympian and multi time National Champ), Will Black (Texas legend), Jason Sager (Texas legend and pro mountain biker, and head honcho of the Jamis Factory Team), and various other super fit dudes who I can't remember the names of at the moment. One of these "unnamed ones" was an Iron Man runner up recently... yikes! Oh, and that weirdo Lance finally gave in and decided to race.

For some strange reason that I still do not know the answer to, I got called up front row! This meant good start position, as well as being surrounded by some of my heros. Not the least of which was this guy...

From left to right: Dave Weins, Lance Armstrong, Kevin Fish, and me. Oh yeah, there were a ton of fans also.

When JHK was called up to the line, the hundreds of fans went crazy. When Lance rolled up, they went berserk. Right up until the gun went off, people were screaming and clammoring: "How about a smile Lance?" "Can you sign my helmet Lance?" "Are you going to beat Dave again Lance?" "How about JHK Lance?"

Also, as soon as he rolled up, 10 or 15 photographers and TV crews jumped up in front. Velonews did a pre-race interview right there on the spot. By the way, Jason Sumner is tall!

I managed to take full advantage of my front row grid position, and was around 5th or 6th into the singletrack. That's right, out of 60 plus racers. I believe Rookie Wetherald got the hole shot, then JHK, Fawley, Sager, Lance and then me. Apparently I got a bit over-hyped, and about 5 minutes in started going backwards a bit... actually a lot. Or I thought so at least, until Mr. Weins himself finally came by about halfway through the first lap, and gave me a little push and said something like: "Come on man, you got it. We're all hurtin'. " By the time the end of the first lap started to near, I had begun to find my legs again, and was starting to make some forward progress... until. Coming out of the trees, into the start/finish, I dabbed on one the million off camber, mud greased rocks and put a foot down. My foot slipped and I completely hit the deck, as did my bike. I heard a nice loud "CRACK!", jumped up, and hoped against hope that I hadn't just done in my brand new frame. I hadn't... I'd done in my brand new brakes. Apparently the rear brake hose had been sheered off right where it meets the caliper, and I had no more rear brake. In another race, on a tamer course with non muddy, sketchy conditions, or if my front brake had gone out, I may have continued, but I'm not Brian Lambert or Joe Graff, and wasn't about to tackle this beast brakeless.

I pulled off at the feedzone, and found myself more dejected and upset than I think I've been after a race before. Watching as the 45-50 other Pros who had been behind me, passed one by one, only twisted the knife in the wound.

Derek came up to me and let me know that Lance had flatted and was out of the race as well, only slightly making me feel better.

Eventually my frustration began to wear off, and when one of the SRAM techies walked up and asked if he could borrow my bike for a few minutes, I began to feel a bit less like the weekend had been a complete disaster. 20 minutes later I picked it back up, complete with brand new brake pads, rear rotor and completely functional rear brake. Apparently SRAM doesn't just make the best drivetrains, but also have some of the best service. They had all kinds of cool interactive displays set up, with the one and only Greg "Hairball" Herbold there telling you why you should drop a few grand for a drive train. And by the way, it's worth the money. As my dad put it after riding my bike for 5 seconds in the driveway: "Wow, Shimano better get to work." That's coming from a guy who's sworn he'd never use anything but Shimano.

While I sat there and cheered on my fellow mud-smeared teammates and friends, I suddenly found a large furry animal looking thing attached to a long pole right under my nose. A very french looking fellow, with a THICK accent holding a microphone, put it to my face while the camera man shoved his camera in my face and asked: "What you think Armstrong no famous in world but much famous here and he very much like?" I'm sorry, whaaa...???

We eventually got things worked out and I explained that, actually, I thought Lance was quite liked by many people around the globe; yes, we Texans are very proud of him; and yes he is my hero. Turns out they were a TV crew from the Netherlands, but just had a French attitude. Luckily they didn't ask me if Lance had taught me how to dope yet, so maybe they weren't completely French.

While my race went less than ideally, my teammate and racing friend Kevin Fish had an incredible race. With many of the top names like Lance, Will Black, Rick Wetherald and others also succumbing to the bike eating nature of the course, Kevin was able to claw his way very far towards the front. He ended up finishing fourth, beating many of Texas' best Pros such as Scott Henry and Matt Gordon! It was amazing to watch, and I am so happy for him. I think he really turned some heads with that result. Also, I believe the team ended up with 3 in the top 10, which is excellent for the stacked field that we faced.

I kinda snatched this off of Singletrack.com... is that legal?!

Kevin up there with some heavy hitters. Like a freagin' Olympian, and Sager's little boy

(Photo courtesy of Chris Vandivere aka Karma Biker)

After he flatted out, Lance came back to watch the rest of the race. The rider is Matt Gordon, new addition to out team for the '10 season. A living legend.

I was flattered to know that Lance remembered me, even if it was only a week ago! We exchanged some quick words before he went back to signing autographs etc. Notice how, no matter who's talking to me, I stay resting on the top tube, saving all my energy for the race. That's Pro, kids. Hopefully Lance understood.

Ripped this one off CyclingNews.com Also by Chris Vandivere. The caption read:

"Brothers Ian (left, finished second in singlespeed) and Eric Fleming (finished 23rd in pro men's race) enjoy the sunset after a slippery preride. "Fast" runs in the family."

The Fleming's are finally getting some much deserved PR

So I guess that about does it for the Mellow Johnny's 2009. Hopefully my MJ race of 2010 will go

a bit better. I've raced Lance twice now, and had pretty bad luck at both. Hmmmm... time to end that streak I think.

A couple days ago the 2010 ProXCT calendar was released, and I've got some big appointments coming a bit earlier

than expected. The off season is officially over.

Until next time...

Ridin' with Lance (and TayTay and Bjorn)

2009-11-17T18:03:00.000-08:00

Since my last post I've started working with the new Power Tap. After only my first ride or two, I could tell why so many accomplished cyclists swear by it. It was really neat to watch the numbers of the amount of work I was doing at that moment, go up and down, exactly in sync with how much effort I put in.

After figuring out the basics, I spent a few days on the indoor trainer doing some base line testing. I was pleased with what the coach had to say after looking the numbers over, because what he said was good, but what is even better is that I know I can and will do so much more. The Power Tap came with a really neat computer program called Power Agent that lets you do all kinds of in depth analysis that is really, really going to be helpful this season. Can't wait!

Here's an example of what the program looks like. Christian's the one who gets to decipher it all.

The biggest news of the week however, is about Lance. But wait, bare with me here, It isn't just another worshipping session. As most of y'all have likely heard, Lance Armstrong was kind enough to lend out his ranch in Dripping Springs to the TMBRA crew, to have a mountain bike race on his trails. I along with about 400 or 5oo others were out to pre-ride the race-course. I had been invited out on an "exclusive" visit by my friend Derek Russey, the one who is responsible for the ranch, and one of Lance's close friends, to pre-ride the course a few weeks ago. We went out again on Sunday, with the plan of getting in a nice long ride and a bunch of laps. However, Saturday night, I received a call from Derek saying to come over to the ranch a bit earlier than scheduled, because someone might be there waiting to ride with me.

Derek has been trying for a good year to get Lance and I together, but as those who follow him on Twitter know, he's just about the most busy man on the planet, maybe next only to the Prez. But, here was the call I had been waiting for. Needless to say, I didn't sleep a whole lot that night.

The next morning I talked to Derek after we arrived at the Ranch and he said that Lance, Taylor Phinney and Bjorn Selander were out on a road ride, but to hang around, get some laps in... and maybe something would happen.

I did three laps of the course, one medium tempo, one "racier" and a third fairly chilled out with fellow local Pro junior racers Will Rader and Kevin Fish. Love those guys by the way. At around noon I decided to hang around the venue and catch up with some racing friends. Around 1:30 or so, I got a call from Derek who was over at the "off limits" ranch house, and told I could mosey on over. I sprinted.

Lance's "Ranch House" is incredible. Nothing huge, but beautifully landscaped and kept up (thanks to Derek), complete with an incredible water feature that I can only describe as a massive rock/water pool/mirror thingy. Never really seen anything like it, but it's striking. Derek told me to go over to the garage and introduce myself.

As I write this, I have butterflies in my stomach, so you can probably imagine the way I felt in the moment. The scene that greated me was one I had only previously seen in my dreams. A huge garage with 5o some odd bikes, half of which were previous Tour de France machines. Memorabilia lined the walls, along with the gorgeous boutique and individual bicycles. One of his famous "Lone Star" TT helmets sat perched atop the mounted head of a wild hog. There were four wheelers, kayaks, and bikes bikes bikes. And there, leaning on the hood of his "LiveStrong" mule, was The Man, staring straight at me. I could tell he was sizing me up... help?

I walked up, introduced myself, and for the next five or ten minutes, "shot the breeze" with my life long hero. Taylor Phinney, member of the Trek/Livestrong U23 team, and multi time World Champ only at the ripe old age of 19, as well as Bjorn Selander, also of the Trek/Livestrong U23 team, sauntered in, and went about directing the mechanics on setting up some mountain bikes for them.. they were going to ride with me too?!

As one of the mechanics tried to figure out what was wrong with Taylor's brakes, Lance and I talked about equipment: 29er vs. 26, the new Sram XX stuff, and why I rode a "Euro" 26" HT.

When things were dialed in on all the bike, Lance slung a leg over his Leadville winning, and specially painted Trek Top Fuel 9.9 Taylor rode a GF Superfly 29er, and made the wheels look small.

On our I way out, I quickly talked to Davis Phinney, living legend, and winner of a stage of the Tour. He cut me off while introducing myself, and said: "Payson, Payson McElveen, right? Your supposedly the next thing." Silly Derek.

As we rode through the parking area of the "public" (I couldn't help but think of them this way, by this point), we rode in our little foursome. Soon there was a chorus of "Hey Lance! Hey, Mr. Armstrong!" etc.

We hit the singletrack, Lance in the lead, then Bjorn, then Taylor, and me in tow. I never really could decide if Taylor was completely out of control, and barely holding it together, or super a good bike handler always on the limit. Soon a little gap began to form between Lance and Bjorn, and when he and Taylor pulled off to fix a little mechanical issue, I rode up behind Lance. We continued on alone.

All those myths about Lance having lousy bike handling skills? I can tell you for a fact that he is one of the best, if not the best bike handler I've ridden behind. It was incredible. Drifting turns, gapping rock gardens and generally shredding the heck out of his home course. We rode along at a fairly good tempo, nothing ridiculous, but not dwadling either. As we passed other pre-riders, a routine began to emerge: Lance or I would yell "Riders back" as usual, and as usual they'd pull over. As we passed, they'd do a doubletake, and then let out an exuberant "HEY LANCE!!" and then a much more surprised "Payson?!" They would then, no matter who they were, put out every ounce of energy they had to stay on the wheel for as long as they could.

Everything about Lance and my ride together was surreal. We had great conversation, full of Lance's witty humor, as well as feeble efforts of my own. We talked the past, the future, the family and the state. Bikes, babes and movies. Laughing to myself, I realized that this was nothing new.

Another interesting thing I noticed, is how eerily familiar it seemed. I have studied this guy so intensely, and so long, that it seemed he was a close friend. The same little tick of pulling his shorts at the beginning of the ride, the same out of the saddle form accelerating out of corners, and same familiar hump in the back that he is famous for.

Towards the end of the ride, Lance bobbled on a ledge that I made it up, and making a bit of a leap of faith, I continued on. He let me lead home, and I'll admit I pushed it a bit more. What would you do with a 7 time Tour winner on your wheel?

Back at the ranch house, I was on my way over to Derek when Lance called me back. He suggested a picture, and Anne Hansen and (I'm guessing) the nanny came out. After the picture was taken, he posted it to his Twitter page. A fleeting thought went through my head at that moment, that I'll explain in a minute. We said out goodbye's, and all too soon it was over.

We never saw Bjorn or Taylor again, but apparently they came back with this to say: Taylor" That was hard!" and when Derek asked Bjorn: "How was Payson?", Bjorn said:" What do you mean how was he? He dropped the heck out of me!"

The funny thing is, these two could have dropped me like a stone in 5 seconds on the road, and probably have power outputs twice that of mine. They are freaking beasts on the road and track, but just maybe don't rip the singletrack on a daily basis.

I rode back over to the truck in the public parking area, where my dad was waiting for me with, I think, tears in his eyes. Incredibly, there wasn't a whole lot of talking on the short drive home, as he was giving me time to reflect, and let things sink in.

As soon as I got home, I went back to the computer and checked my Twitter. 45 minutes earlier, before Lance had posted the picture, I had 33 followers. Now I had over 200! I couldn't believe it, but at the same time, sort of expected it. It doesn't matter who you are, but brushed by Lance, and you'll experience a bit of fleeting fame. I later found out, that of North American mountain bikers, my name had been googled 750 times in about 24 hours. Usually Geoff Kabush is at the top of the list with about 500. Although all of this is a bit entertaining, it does nothing but emphasize the extreme influence Mr. Armstrong has.

If there is one image that will stick in my mind until the day I die, I think it is this: Looking up, and seeing my hero, Lance Armstrong staring me straight in the eye, giving a grin, and extending his hand: "Hi, I'm Lance." ...You don't say.

There is something about that guy, for me at least, that just radiates an intense energy. I still can't seem to find words for it, but he has such a presence when in a room, and just has a way of seeming utterly super-human.

I will never forgot the day that I ripped some singletrack, alone in the Texas hill country, with my hero Lance Armstrong.

Lance posted this to his Twitter site after we rode, and wrote this:

"Just ripped a hot lap w/ @Paysonmcelveen. He's 16 w/ some serious power. Remember his name folks."

I would like to send out a massive THANK YOU to Derek Russey who made all this happen. Derek, I don't deserve a bit of this, and I am eternally in your debt. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Cyclocross, Late School Nights, Powermeters, New Bike, Rocky Hill... Oh my!

2009-11-08T16:44:00.000-08:00

Lots has happened in the last week or so. I went out to the Wurst Cross Cyclocross race in New Braunfels for some training. Turns out, I needed it. I got completely demolished, as I slogged away on my mountain bike through the tall grass. Somehow I still ended up 9th, but I felt so incredibly slow and unlike myself that I was pretty unhappy the rest of the day. I knew that I'd had a really chill off season, but it was just SO bad.

A couple days later, the Dirt Derby was canceled, so I did some "Hells Intervals". I just know when Christian puts these on the plans he's laughing at the future pain he's asserted for me. These intervals consist of 2 sets of 8x 20 secs. all out, 10 secs. "recovery". I say "recovery" because those ten seconds are just about long enough to shift down, and shift right back up again.

Wednesday rolled around, and I got the email I'd been waiting for. My bike had arrived. For those that don't know, last years bike was a whole new world for me. Carbon fiber, European blingness. Sub 20 lbs.

Upgrades to the 2010 model would include a new paint job, lighter bars, and the long awaited Sram XX 2x10 drivetrain. Needless to say, I was pretty excited when I finally walked into BSS this past Friday, after a good 2 months impatient waiting. Here are pics:

Weighed it right in the shop

Nuff said

Ohh, and that's with a cushy saddle and some packaging stuff. Sub 19, I think we can do it.

Our new team kits match the '10 paint scheme perfectly. This is of utmost importance.

The XX 2x10 drivetrain is unique. With a 39x26 front crankset and 11x36 rear cogset, you get all the ratios and gears you would with a regular 3x9 set up, only without the ratio cross over. In a race, the big ring is used exclusively, and any chain line works. Can't cross-chain this baby!

The rear derailleur is beautiful, with carbon and titanium galore.

The graphics are bold and stylin'

I really like all the white on this years paint job

A white and very hollowed out top cap shaves grams and looks sweet

More beautiful graphics on the carbon shifters

Like last year, Specialized incorporates their carbon tapered head tube to add stiffness to the frame

Possibly the most impressive aspect of the all ready groundbreaking Sram XX drivetrain, is the cogset. Machined out one solid piece of aluminum, the entire cogset is hollow. This results in the lightest cogset of all time, despite it having a whole extra ring. It is said that it takes 24 strait hours to machine one cogset.

The XX brakes shave weight and add control and power over previous years models.

Specialized's attention to detail is impressive and appreciated. Red spoke nipples add style.

A DT Swiss made carbon hub

I was very happy to see that the Brain in the fork was again included. This is what sets the bike apart from competitor's top notch bikes. I truly feel this is a huge advantage to me.

The Rainbow stripes are thanks to Christoph Sauser and now recently Burry Stander. Maybe one day those will be thanks to me!

While at the shop, we learned my Power Tap had come in also. I am very excited to start using this tool that all the serious guys insist is one of, if not the best investments you can make.

Also this past week, school has been hammering me hard. Everyone warned me that Junior year would be hard, and it really is. Up 11:00 Thursday night and then 12:45 friday was not my idea of a good time. Friday night I had 8 hours and 15 minutes of unbroken school work. A combo of that, and not really having time to eat dinner for two nights dropped me from my regular weight of 137 to 133!!

Also this week, my dad has spent a good couple days working on a bridge out at Rocky Hill that got washed out from all the rain. This is exactly the type of project my dad lives for, and as always took pride in his work and did an excellent job. He got many well deserved compliments from racers this past weekend. Here are a couple pictures and a little video of me pre-riding it on my new bike:

It's in a gorgeous location, and has a neat little curve through the trees.

As you can tell from all the flotsum in the trees, the river went way up, and took the old bridge down river.

The bridge is smooooooooth.

This bridge was for the Rocky Hill race, which was this past weekend. I was looking forward to it, because this is one of my favorite courses, and it was another opportunity to turn my pre-season around, but at the same time, I wasn't holding my breath. I know what an unforgiving race of truth this sport is.

This race was unique in that it was one 21 mile lap for all categories. For my workout the day before, I was to do a 2 hour ride, so I thought I'd hit 3 birds with one stone, and pre-ride the course and test out my new bike as well.

As expected the course was mint and the bike like I was riding a Dirt Bike. Never thought this would be possible, but yes, this years is much faster than last years version. Although I couldn't decide whether to use the little or the big ring at pre-ride pace, I knew the big would be perfect on race day.

After getting in a solid warm up on the trainer, I lined up on the front row with Texas Legend Jason Sager, and his Jamis Factory rider Adam "Snoodle" Snyder. These two big guns were down South for a bit of prep before the Lance race in a couple weeks. I got an awesome start and had a pretty solid race all around. I was back. I felt fast, pretty much from start to finish, and was right in the mix. I ended up 6th, which put me in the solid money. SWEET!! 10 minutes in and my saddle slipped. If I had had my multi tool, I for sure would have pulled over and fixed it. Instead I kept going and just tapped it back into place 4 or 5 times, while on the fly. It was nothing that really slowed me down.

Although it was nice to get a fairly good result, I am happiest about the fact that I am much stronger than I would have expected at this point in the season, considering my super mellow past couple months. I am feeling very confident for next season. Bring it Euros!!!

Ruston

2009-10-28T18:42:00.001-07:00

So the Ruston Stage Race was last weekend, and both the McElveen boys attended. After being on the fence for a week, we finally decided "screw it" and went. At first we were undecided because of the possibility of a 6th mud race in a row, which usually means expensive bike repairs... and it did.

As soon as we got there after the 7 hr drive, we knew we had made the right decision. We set up camp next to our racing family, the Flemings, and I made my way over to the Cycle Progression Trailer where I had been told some fun was taking place. Alex Arumi, owner and founder of the really neat new bike shop in town: Cycleprogression, his Ace Pro Racer Mr. Will Ross, the unbeatable Scott Henry, Eric Fleming Ian Fleming and the dog were all sprawled out, munching on fresh baked chocolate chip cookies (sshhhhh!!) and gazing at the 80" plasma flat screen. I settled in, and we all had a great time laughing at "What happens in Vegas". It was one of the most enjoyable nights I've had in awhile, and realized how lucky we all are to have the TMBRA circuit. A quick note on what makes this particular race so special: Of course the Stage Race format, and awesome trails... but most of all, the people who put on the race, and the amount of work they put into it, to make it the best it can be. While warming up for my time trial I noticed they had guys, LEAF BLOWING and SWEEPING the singletrack of pine needles and leaves. Seriously?? During the XC race, they had people adding dirt to soupy holes that had developed during the previous categories races. The pride taken in putting on this race is truly a model for all.

Anyway, my plan was to put in a good solid weekend of racing to try and break myself out of my lazy mold of "Off Season-itis." I have done a couple races this off season, but none too seriously, and I figured it was time to make it hurt a little.

Short Track: 1 lap in I could tell I was not having a good race. I was going backwards, but knew guys would start to fade in the last ten minutes or so, while I seem to typically get stronger during days like these. However, about the time I was expecting to start feeling good, my left Crankbrothers 4ti eggbeater decided to quit being a clipless pedal. Not cool. Not sure what the issue was, except the fact that now had a V4 engine instead of V8 , I rode around with one leg... and got lapped a gillion times. Yes, I finished last, but did finish, which meant 15th place points or whatever... important in a stage race.

TT: Feeling fired up due to my mechanical, I borrowed Pa's SPDs and attacked the Time Trial course, blind. Thanks to recon my dad did during his race, I learned that it would be short. Turned out to be around 8 or 9 minutes, and a heck of a course. After the race I had really no idea how I had finished. I felt like I had been moving well, but at one point went flying off the trail and had to bushwhack back on, which I new would cost me a second or two at least. Turned out I finished 8th or something, one second off 7th, 2 seconds off 6th, and 3 seconds off 5th. Bummer.

XC: Last year in the XC race at Ruston, while racing Cat 1 19-29, Chris Drummond and I were basically tied for the overall. We both went into the race with the game plan of destroying the other from the gun, knowing that whomever finished on top, took home the cash. Turned out that, through a combo of our brilliant tactics, and not eating anything, I bonked ridiculously hard and just barely made it home. It was quite an experience. It was the real deal: Freezing cold, ravenously hungry, delirium, double vision... it was a disaster.

Anyway, that was the sort of thing I was going to try to avoid this time around, and figured I'd focus on nutrition for the race this year. I had a great first lap, pretty lousy second lap and slid pretty far back, and than had a heck of a 3rd lap. I caught a bunch of guys and ended up 6th or something. No idea where that put me in the GC, but I accomplished my goal of getting in a solid weekend of fun, hard racing.

What I learned from this race however, is that I can't really expect to do well having not trained seriously since July. I definitely have some work to do. Luckily, when I came home from school today, my dad informed me that he had ordered a Cyclops Power Meter. Ladies and Gentlemen, things are about to heat up. From what I've heard, this is a must have tool for reaching the next level, and I'm looking forward to all the glorious pain it will surely bring.

I'm looking forward to the first Cross race of the year for me this coming weekend, and hope to bring in some cash so I can get some Oakleys!

The legs are still hairy, and my new bike still isn't here. Maybe the two are linked?

Cross-Country Running Season Recap

2009-10-19T17:54:00.000-07:00

In the past two or three weeks I have ridden maybe a total of 4 or 5 times. That is pretty much nothing. Had I not been torturing myself in another fashion, this would have been extremely unacceptable. However, I was torturing myself in other ways. I decided to do the last two races of the TAPPS (Texas Association Private and Parochial Schools) XC running season. I ran track in 6th and 7th grade, but it had still been awhile. We had talked about doing this for cross training last year, but it wasn't until we heard that "The Seth Kemp" (he's the Lance version of the Junior Cat 1 category for the U.S.) did it, that I gave in. Even though I had been decent in Middle School, I figured I aught to put in a week of some serious running training before my first meet. What I learned from running: IT HURTS!!!! Definitely right up there with VO2 max intervals on the trainer, both in terms of excitement level and the soothing effect it has on your body... not much.

In my first meet, I ran a 5:15 first mile... and an eternity later staggered in for a 17:35 and 15th place out of 80. An alright finish I thought, for my first race and considering the fact that I murdered that annoying pacing thingy.

After experiencing some crucifying calf and hamstring soreness and some weird random hip muscles I had no clue existed the first couple days after the race, I got ready for the State Championship meet the next weekend.

We traveled out to Waco to meet the masses. After laughing at the continuity between us being the only non-parochial school, and also the only one without a giant tour bus with our schools name plastered on the side, we signed in and warmed up. I ran within myself for the first couple miles, and then drove it home with what I had left. Put in the hardest effort so far this year, and grabbed third place out of the 107 starters. Cool. 3 of the 5 guys on our team went 1st, 3rd and 6th... and somehow still didn't win the overall. Oh well.

A huge congratulations to team mate and good friend Gregory Becker, no one was even close to him.

However... I hate losing, more than most everything else. Next year I'm winning this thing. Judging by my progress over the short time I spent on this "not nearly as fun as mountain biking" activity, I think I've got a good shot. If nothing else, this kept my fitness up, and *sigh* I must admit was more fun than I expected.

This medallion of "sub-par-ness" will remind me of next year's mission

Yesterday I was able to get out on the bike for a real ride for the first time in awhile. A great solo 55 out in the Texas Hill Country. Doorstep to Pedernales Falls to Doorstep. It was a picture perfect day. Here are a couple pics:

The sky was completely cloudless

Out for some good ol' Texas Hill Country Rollers

Bad roads and steep hills... some of the best ridin' in the world

Some good flow in the Pedernales

While I was stretching on the side of the road, a couple dudes passed me in a tight little two man pace line. They looked up, I waved, and they looked back down with zero acknowledgment... too cool to be bothered at their high rate of speed. Not sure about you, but this was a severe violation in my "how to be awesome" handbook. I quickly finished up, jumped on, and went after them. It was supposed to be a Zone 1 day, but it's the off season... that excuse is no longer going to be an option pretty soon. I caught them, and reveled in the looks on their faces. Without too much talking, I continued on, and pretty soon they were dropped. Mission accomplished.

Next issue of the Racing Post will have me as "Cover Boy" and Junior Spotlight. They also asked me to include a story along the lines of "Why I Ride". They also gave me the opportunity to write a monthly column, so I'm looking forward to that. Let me know if y'all have any good material.

Next up, Ruston Stage Race.