Tufo Flexus Primus Tubular CX Tires

After experiencing CX last year on my MTB with cx tires and having a great time, I decided to step it up this year. One of the major factors on a CX bike is being able to run low tire pressure to allow for better traction and added suspension to smooth out the rough spots. The down fall of running low tire pressures with standard tires/tubes is the possibility of pinch flatting or rolling the tire off of the bead on the rim. Pinch flatting is where the tire impacts an object hard enough that the rim slams down on the the tire "pinching" the tube between the tire and the rim causing a flat. Pulling the tire off the bead is exactly what is sounds like... the tire doesn't have enough pressure to keep the tire hook into the bead of the rim and it comes off. Either scenario will force you to either DNF or run for the pit to swap wheels or bikes. Either way you are going to loose a lot of time and cost you positions in the race. The solution is to run a tubular tire which is basically a heavy duty tube with tread attached that is glued to a special style of rim. This solves the issues described above and also reduces the rotating weight, lightening the bike and increasing acceleration.

After doing some research and talking with some racers, I decided to go with the Tufo Flexus Primus tubular (http://www.tufonorthamerica.com/tires/elite.php?seriesid=51). This tire is a little more expensive than some of the other brands out there but makes up for it by being more durable and easier to mount and true. This particular tire has been completely revamped for 2009 to improve suppleness (ride quality), decrease rolling resistance (By 10%), increase durability and improve wet traction. Tufo was very responsive to my questions and easy to deal with. Once the tires arrived, I had them mounted up to my Revolution Wheelworks REV-25X wheels (http://www.revolutionwheelworks.com/REV-25X.html) and ready to go for the Waterford Double Cross weekend.

After 3 races, I am thoroughly impressed with these tires. They roll with ease and smooth out the bumps, but what they do best is corner. Each race I have pushed them further than the race before. They have instilled confidence in my abilities and have allowed me to maintain speed in critical corners. One cool feature that I have noticed is that they have an audible growl in the corners that reminds me of being on my MTB!

CX is upon us!!

Well… the season opener for CX has come and gone. It was a fun weekend of pain and reacclimation to one of the most exciting forms of bicycle racing. I have been pretty happy with my MTB performance the latter half of the year and was looking forward to seeing where I would stack up in the mix of MTB and Roadies in CX. All in all I am happy with the results. My times were competitive although not consistent and I am finishing in the top half of the field.

Saturday Race –
I lined up in the second row behind a couple fast guys and the starting sprint landed me at about 6th wheel. I held the wheel of the guy in front of me until a tight 180 about a 1/3rd of way through the lap. At that point, he parked it in the corner and my avoidance maneuver put me into the rope which somehow looped my bar and seat post. By the time my bike was free about 10+ guys went by and I had to start working my way back through the field. I drafted people as long as possible and then went by until I caught Adam Naish. We rode together for the last 2 laps or so swapping places… I was excited to have someone to race. I wanted to be in front coming into the finishing straight, so I pushed hard through the final barriers and just beat him out for the next corner. I attacked on last grass flat before the asphalt, but as we started the finishing sprint Adam rolled up next to me and won by a wheel. It was a good race but I learned some lessons and was looking forward to applying them on Sunday. Big thanks to Jeff Zimmerman for towing me around for a couple of laps!


Sunday Race –
Come Sunday morning my legs were feeling a little dead but not as bad as I thought. After warming up, I was feeling like all 8 cylinders were firing. Based on my start yesterday, I lined up in the front row and was in about the same position after the sprint. To add some excitement they changed some sections and ran others in reverse. One of the changes ran us down a sandy area that we were running up on Saturday. I decided to ride it on the first lap, which was a big mistake as I was bogged down coming out of it and allowed a group to pass me. Another lesson learned. I held a pretty good pace and stayed near the leaders until the end of the 2nd lap. As I fell off the pace I found myself on my own. The hard part about be on your own during a bike race is that you have no one to draft off of. My pace on the road sections dropped and I could tell that I was being caught by a group of guys working together. I held my own for a couple laps and then was passed by a couple guys. I grabbed a wheel and tried to recover a little. I noticed the guy ahead of me, who happened to be Chris Matthews, was running out of gas, so I went around on the second to last lap. Chris rode my wheel all the way to the final straight. Learning from yesterday’s race I took it easy until I hit the asphalt and then started my sprint. Chris was coming on strong, but I held off the attack finishing 12th of 28 guys.

Next race is this Sunday at Pando to finish up the MMBA CPS series. I need to finish one place behind the guy in third to win my class if he shows up. If I can finish well at this race, it will put the exclamation point on my MTB season winning both the Tailwind and MMBA CPS series.

Addison Oaks MMBA XC

Since finishing well at the Stony TT and Maybury MMBA events, I saw an opportunity to win my class in both the MMBA and the Tailwind series. In order to do this, I needed to race the remaining 2 races in order to have the minimum 5 races required to be considered for the year end awards. I also know that in order for me to win the series, I would have to win one of the next 2 races. Being that it has already been a long season and CX is starting soon, my motivation to race more MTB races has declined. Knowing that I need to win one race, I focused my efforts on Addison Oaks as I consider this trail to be my home court. I took a week off the bike at the end of August to try and regroup and then hit it hard. The 2 weeks before the race, I had completed 7 near race pace laps and formulated a plan of attack for the race.

With CX coming up and Kinetic Systems putting on a Clinic, which happened to be the day before Addison Oaks, I headed over to work on my skillz (Which need a lot of work!). Knowing that I didn’t want to completely wear myself out, I didn’t participate in the mock race and just focused on the clinic portion. Needless to say, I rode too hard and climbed the orange-crush (http://cowbell.cxmagazine.com/video/orange-crush-flyover) a few too many times and I was beat! The next morning I felt flat and still had to clean the bike and load all my stuff into the car… I was less than motivated to race.

Once at the race, I watched the Expert and Elite guys go by a few times, picked up my registration pack and got ready to warm up. After riding around a while I really wasn’t feeling it, but knew that once the race started I would get into my zone. Not having raced too many MMBA races, I didn’t know a lot of faces at the starting line which made me nervous. Although one face was very familiar and that was my buddy Mark Bourgeau, who I knew would love to take the win and was more than capable. I rolled to the front right at the start and I could see people shuffling for position out of the corner of my eye. We hit the first hill and I attacked to try and drop as many people as possible right at the start. Things quieted down pretty quick behind me, but I could hear someone there and didn’t want to look. About a mile or 2 in we caught a large group of guys in the single track. I debated trying to pick them off one by one, but decided that would be too risky and waited for the 2 track. I picked some of them off on a short open section helping to put a gap between myself and the rest of the field, but was starting to worry that the slower pace was allowing them to bridge back up. It seemed like forever and I was almost taken down by a mishap, but the 2 track came and I hit the gas. At this point I figured out that the guy on my tail was Mark which made me a little nervous. I debated taking turns pulling, but I was gapping him on the flats making him work to keep up. As we rolled through the start/finish, I had a small gap and pushed the first uphill to try and open things up and get some more riders between us. At this point I was feeling good and having fun… until I heard someone yell at me and when I looked it was Mark again!! It was at a point where the trails loops back, so I didn’t really know how far back he was… but I wasn’t going to hang around to find out. At the start of the third lap I looked back and didn’t see him. I proceeded to work my way through the last lap and even caught my wife in the last couple of miles. I rolled across the finish line only 50sec ahead of Mark. In the end, even though I didn’t feel 100%, I still managed to win and had the second fastest sport time. Next XC race is Pando… I need to finish no more than 1 place behind the second place guy in order to win the series. Hopefully my last sport race will be a good one!

Final Tailwind USAC Standings

The year started a little rough, but I pulled it together to finish the year strong!! Expert will be a new learning curve, but should be a fun one!

Maybury TT

After getting beat a month ago at the Stony TT, I was not sure how I would fair at Maybury. I have been a little off my game since the 12hr of Stony, but I figured that if I could pull off a win at Maybury I would still have a chance to win the MMBA CPS series in addition to the Tailwind series. I pre-rode the course on Tuesday and was feeling confident until the rain rolled in this week... especially the morning of. I preregistered, so I decided to make the drive and see how I would fair. I am not the best rider when it is wet and sloppy.

Usually in a TT they line up the preregistered racers by class and when you registered, for some reason they organized the start times by class, age and alphabetical order? This put me next to last in my class and behind 2 other age groups. The age groups weren't a big deal, but I knew I would be passing people. I rolled up to the line and was off! I knew I could catch the guy that left in front before the single track, so I hammered the first flat section and caught him by the first climb going into the single track. As I caught people, they would usually just move aside and let me by, which was very appreciated. Maybury has a lot of short climbs, so I tried to stand when ever possible to try and keep momentum. They added a lot of road and paved path sections to increase the mileage this year, so I tried to tap my inner roadie and hold a nice tempo when ever possible. Not wanting to lose by a small margin again, I stood up and sprint the section coming into the finish line. At the end of the day the effort was enough to hold on to the top spot in my age group. This is my first win of the MMBA series... next stop in this series is Addison Oaks.

Pontiac Lake XC - 1st Place

I look at Pontiac as “the” race of the year. Pontiac is a great race course that has a little bit of everything… great climbs, technical down hills and fast flats. It is also at a time of the year that people are peaked fitness wise and usually not yet suffering from burn out. The Sport 35-39 class has been fast this year, as usual, and all of the top players were present. Shawn Schaffert, Tony Bastuk, Mark Bourgeau and I lined the front row. When the whistle blew, it was a 4 wide, bar to bar drag race for the first 100ft or so and I have to admit that I was a little nervous, as I didn’t want to start this race with a wreck! It was going to be a long race and I wasn’t going to win it in the first ¼ mile, so I eased up and let Mark and Tony go. I think Shawn had the same thought as he eased up and jumped on my wheel. Before the hump into the main trail I noticed that Tony faded a little so I surged around him to jump on Mark’s wheel. We had one close call right at the start as there was a guy that was late for his start time that left a few seconds before us and the group caught him just before we entered the woods. I think Mark scared him, as he started veering off the trail and then jumped back in just as I was coming by. I was able to avoid him and stay upright with out losing too much time to Mark. I heard Tony compliment me on my recovery, but I was sure that it was just one of many close calls that would happen during the next 19+ miles. The group of 4 stayed together until 2 mile hill when Mark and I split a slower rider on the climb and gapped Tony and Shawn. I rode Marks wheel for a while knowing that I could go a little faster, but I liked the pace and thought that it would allow me to have more energy later in the race. Mark was starting to slow a little on the climbs at around mile 5, so I went around him and immediately tried to break his will!! Thinking I put a reasonable gap on him, I settled into a comfortable pace. On the last climb near the end of the first lap, I looked back and saw that he was only about 10 sec behind… needless to say his will was still intacted and I was a little worried at this point. Once on the flat, I tucked into an aero position and tried to gain some time. Knowing my strength was on the climbs and his was on the descents with his full suspension bike, I pushed the pace on every climb and tried to be smooth on the descents. With about a half a lap to go, I started seeing a guy behind me that I though was Mark. It ended up being a Sport Clyde that was crazy fast with a similar jersey, althought it motivated me to go faster for a few miles! Once over the last climb, I tucked down and hammered to the finish and took the win by 40s over Mark. My first lap was 43:47, which is my best lap ever at Pontiac and over 2 mins faster than my first lap last year. The second lap was 4 min faster than the second lap last year. The hard work is paying off and hopefully I can make similar gains next year to allow me to be competitive in the expert class. This race solidifies my 1st place standing in my class, so I will be entering my first expert race at Stony in a couple of weeks to see where I currently stand amongst the big boys!

I would like to thank Chris, Tony, Ron and all of the guys at Fraser Bike for their support, my wife and kids for allowing me the time to train and race, Robert for running such a great series and Cannondale for producing such an awesome bike!

Cyclocross Season is almost here... Decisions!?

Red or Black?