AZT scouting, MBAA Estrella

The flowers have continued to be off the hook on the from-the-house rides. Makes me happy every time I go out.

Good spots: Rock Wren right out of the Genser Trailhead (above), A Mtn’s Sentinel Ridge Trail and associated unnamed trails, Camino de Oeste Trail, both sides of the rock house. Hurry, they are closing up and blowing away!

Flower power intervals on A Mtn, round 2.

This time, a brief nap in the yellow, perhaps?

Mt. Wrightson skyline

Like last week, after intervals I got out for a day of AZT scouting with Lee Blackwell. Like last week I was hammering away on code and whatever other GPS projects, too. I shipped off a new set of outputs at around midnight, then hit the hay for an early drive down to the Santa Ritas.

I was planning to race in Phoenix on the weekend, and knew this day was a very bad choice right before it. But a day outside was just what I needed, and Lee has the momentum and energy still going on his project. He wanted to knock out a bunch of layout / feasibility on the AZT reroute.

New water source found, hidden in the tall grasses!

The weather was ten times better than last time, and it was just Lee and I, so we moved quickly and covered a lot of ground.

Strangely, we were both beat down by allergy attacks throughout the day. At 5000+ feet, in February? We must have hit the peak day for juniper pollination, or something? It sapped our energy, but we didn’t let it slow us down. Once I got back to Tucson, I was fine.

This formation could prove difficult to build trail through! It’s the fault line that creates the bathtub right below us. We explored at least three different ideas to get off the ridgeline, and none are going to be too easy.

One’s crux is the upper bathtub wall, seen here. You could get a trail through there if you really had to, but it would be a project.

Maybe through this Mars-like dirt area? Punch straight through… might be our only option.

Luckily everything up to this point is golden, we may even be able to extend the KY-camp flume trail with a “super flume”, another mile of mega contour trail, tying in right where the flume starts.

more water on the route

It’s getting late. We are hiking back to check out one more option, but first stop to take the boots off and let the feet rest up, try to avoid blisters. I did my best to build in some rest into the day — a few minutes off the feet here and there — but my legs still got trashed, and my feet were pretty raw. Walking sideslopes and maneuvering through brush is slow going. I guess that’s why we build trails to walk on (and ride!). This is going to be an amazing piece of trail once completed!

MBAA Estrella

I tried my best to recover and get ready for the race, and for a while I was clouded in doubt. Driving all the way to Phoenix for a 2 hour race seemed a little nutty with my feet trashed and legs sore to the touch. Cycling uses different muscles, though, right?

I also had to get over a mental barrier. Once upon a time I tried to do the MBAA series, and I pretty much failed. I had just moved to Tucson, was busy with grad school, and joined a local team. MBAA was about the only races going on, so we made a bunch of trips to race in Phoenix. And I always got flats, crashed, bonked or otherwise got my butt kicked. I made lame excuses about the courses being lame and there not being enough climbing. I started looking elsewhere, and soon was out touring the divide route, then racing it. I haven’t been back to an MBAA race for about 10 years, and even last year when I was doing shorter events, never could get myself to show up to one. I had this lingering insecurity that it wasn’t possible for me to put together a good MBAA race, because I never have.

But you never know if you never try, so I got up @4am and hopped in the car for Phoenix International Raceway, the race track and wasteland of a parking lot that sits in front of the Estrella competitive MTB track. I got registered and headed out for a long warmup on the ‘long’ loop. I was the only one out there, which was unfortunate. For the first half I was falling asleep and trying to remember exactly what I was doing, or even where I was. Phoenix! How did I get here? Oh…

photo by Lorne Trezise

My extended warmup wasn’t enough to ready me for the pace of the Pro/1 group set at the start. I had no idea they started us with the pros, until ~2 min before start. The faster the better, I say, but my positioning was poor. The dust was flying and riders were all over the place! Chaos and pure guts, I love it. Right when my breathing was returning from hyperventilation I started thinking about moving up and getting around the juniors and other hotheads in front of me. Then Chloe Woodruff passed me, and started aggressively making her way up through the guys. Never miss a chance to follow the wheel of a pro that knows what she is doing. I followed her through a bunch of guys, setting a nice steady pace. Chloe was named to the Olympic long team, along with Krista, so I wasn’t surprised to see her out there killing it.

Near the ‘top’ of the ‘climb’ on the long loop I pedaled around her and started setting my sights on the group of pro riders ahead. I caught one right near the top, then went into the descent unsure if I would be faster or slower than others. My ‘big’ bike pays off sometimes — I seemed to be growing a lead on those behind, and also having a hoot of a time. The competitive tracks are designed for racing, so they have steep runs, bermed corners and other features you don’t often find on regular trails. Riding fast is a FUN, and something I don’t do enough of.

photo by Darren Williams (Darren Rides) – maybe someday I’ll show up to a race and NOT self support it. Who races XC and starts with 80 oz water?! And with knee warmers? What a dork.

I was in no-man’s land, unable to bridge up to the group ahead, but also riding away from those behind, until we hit the ‘tech’ loops. Here Mimmo Futia caught me (he had flatted). I let him by, asked his category (Pro — though he had no leg marking) then followed him through the loop. My bike was holding to the sketchy trail much better than his, and though he tried, he couldn’t get away from me. As we hit the second tech loop together I started encouraging him and trying to get him to clean a section he had walked up last time. Little did I know he often wins these races, but he took the encouragement in stride, telling me I was doing “quite awesome.”

It was quite awesome to still be pedaling strong 2+ hours in, and showing no signs of fading. I’ve noticed that no matter how trashed my legs are, I still have an ability to recover from efforts that I’ve never had before. Even short descents out there would have me thinking “I’m not going hard enough” until I realized I couldn’t go hard at the moment, and that was why I was recovering and feeling like a slacker. The tech loop, in particular, was so terrain limited that my HR plummeted and I almost felt like I wasn’t racing at times.

I passed Mimmo when he dabbed on one of the last switchbacks, and had to stop to, uh, regain himself. That put me in 6th out of all categories, 2nd in Cat 1 Open. Finally an MBAA success. Chloe came in for 3rd in Cat 1 Open, beating nearly all of the guys. MBAA puts on a great race, everything went smoothly, folks were super nice and results/awards were quick.

The race may not have been particularly epic at 2:20 total time, but the drive home was. I was blasting the tunes with the windows down for the first half, drinking chocolate milk and loving life. Then I-10 came to a halt, the corsica’s engine bordered on overheating and I nearly perished under the desert sun. It’s time for a new van, already! It was probably only ~80 degrees in Casa Grande, but after racing hard in the sun, 80 felt like 90, and at 2 mph in a Chevy Corsica with no A/C and a leaky radiator, well, it may as well have been 100. There’s no such thing as an easy trip to Phoenix.

But I’m glad I went.