chuck liddell

says happy halloween

i need to spend more time at the bar

yesterday was officially my last day working at the shop. all in all it was more of a necessary decision than a good or bad decision. i certainly wish travis and the shop all the best in years to come and have yet to meet someone i trust working on my bike more than him. as for me, its back up to the bar i've been at part time for the last year but now i'll be there full time as the bar manager. a couple of positives in all of this...i'll be keeping larsson out of daycare two days a week so we can either party at home or i can use his slave labor to help maintain the trails and it means i'll have more daylight hours during the winter to train. hooray sun. random thought for today...black licorice gummy bears and grape gatorade taste like crap together.

how not to end a season (night race recap)

everything was perfect for the night race. the organizers and volunteers had done a great job, the trails were in perfect shape and the weather was holding just well enough to not have to dress very heavy. a little over 50 people showed up and everyone was in a great mood. group rollout to the start, ogara says readysetgo and we're off. climb the long gravel, left into van peenen and head for the single track. trevor olsen was first onto the singletrack at fred's with me in second and max anderson in third. pretty happy with my position at this point cause i know trevor's had some great results in expert wors races this year and i was right on his wheel. didn't know who was in third but felt like the three of us were starting to pull away. knew trevor was down to just his handlebar lights because of problems with his helmet light so i almost asked to get around before the downhill but chose not to. fuck. start bombing down fred's (less than 10 minutes into the race and maybe a half mile into the singletrack). we were moving. and just like that the race was over. wrapped my bike around a tree. i remember the instant recognition of what was happening when my bars hit the tree, and i remember getting to my feet and realizing i was a good ten yards from my bike. don't remember anything in between. apparently it was so bad trevor, who was in front of me, heard it and stopped. max (in third) stopped to check on me. nothing hurt but the bike which is yet to be assessed (hoping nothing's broken, but definitely unrideable). max and trevor rolled on around the hairpin halfway down fred's then trevor slashes a sidewall at the bottom of fred's. max had a good run after that and took the race by something like 3 minutes. huge congrats to marc folkedahl for reminding everyone that he's still one of the fast guys in town with a second place finish. congrats to sarge and brad crawford for third and fourth, respectively. trevor rockwell, eric clement, jimmy tripp and travis grawin made it 7 locals in the top 10. spinner finished the race pedaling with only one leg after breaking a pedal off. biggest congrats of the night goes to garrett mcalister for deciding to do this race on a borrowed bike, borrowed light and only his fourth mountain bike ride ever. dude is a total roadie and finished in the top half of the field...couldn't be happier for him and the rest of the locals that showed up and threw down. as for me...last mountain bike race of the year as far as i know. coming out of the debacle that was september i was really looking forward to finishing the season on a good note and had very high expectations for myself going into this. i know i should be pretty happy that i walked away from what was one of my worst crashes in a really long time but its pretty hard not to be frustrated. but, so it is. been putting my schedule together for next year and there's plenty to be excited about. in the meantime, travis will be working his magic to make sure nothing's seriously wrong with the jabber (broken black sheep fork? trashed king headset? cracked carbon bars?). gonna overhaul the whole thing while he's at it...thanks travis. maybe a few more cross races and back to the gravel grind.

NIGHT RACE TONIGHT!!!!

cold and windy...dark and twisty. how can you not have fun at this thing?

vassago and transiowa!!

man this makes me happy...just got the heads up from misty and went over to check out the transiowa website. vassago has worked out a deal with guitar ted and transiowa to give away a fisticuff at transiowa 5. as of right now i'm still rocking the prototype i was allowed to debut at transiowa last year and it will undoubtedly be my weapon of choice again this year. now...here's hoping a few people finish so somebody can walk off with this gem. yeah, i might be biased, but vassago and the people behind it are pretty fucking cool.

devil's cross

traveled down to the quad cities for the devil's cross race put on by local riding club D.I.C.E. honestly, this course was awesome. there wasn't one thing that was totally outstanding, but as a package it was just cool. a beautiful park, gently rolling, tough cornering over walnuts and acorns, well-placed barriers, downhill turns through soft mud, a tough but manageable run-up and a spectator friendly course of which about 90% could be seen by barely moving. as i lined up for the 3/4 race i looked around and instantly felt a little silly for wondering if there was going to be a single speed category. i was the single speed category. not one other ss seen except what another guy was just rolling around on. oh well, nothing wrong with having my vassago fisticuff stand out in a crowd. ready set go and we're off on a flat, paved sprint to the first corner. the shifty riders big ring it and i'm somewhere mid-pack. the big run-up was about 2/3 through the lap and the first time we got to it i realized that it could be big for me. i ran my way back into the top 5 at the top of the hill, then got picked off by a couple guys and found myself looking at the backs of the top 5 as we got near the end of the first lap. a muddy downhill corner ended one guys race and put me into the top 5. a quick look around made it obvious that we had pulled away from the field, but the top 4 had split into pairs and pulled away from me. one and two were running a tight race and i started gauging my gap to three and four. by the end of the second lap i had a decent grasp on how far behind i was. halfway through the third lap (of seven) i saw fourth falling off. i put everything i had into laps 4 and 5, making up big chunks every lap on the run-up. i passed him at the start of lap six but couldn't shake him. i was afraid i had put everything into passing him and not left enough to hold the pass. the run-up on lap 6 gave me less than 10 yards of breathing room so i just kept hammering. through the final lap he didn't seem to be closing the gap so when i hit the run-up i shouldered the bike in stride, put my head down and dug in. by the time i got to the top and doubled back i was pretty confident all i had to do was keep the bike upright. i finished fourth in the 3/4 race as the only single speed in the field. considering i still don't consider myself much of a cross racer, terribly inexperienced at best, i'll take it. the bike rode flawlessly and the getting rid of the carbon seatpost for the thomson masterpiece with a wtb carbon devo saddle gave me a bit more confidence hopping back on the saddle. anyway, race was awesome. thanks to dad for the hand-ups and trudy for hanging with larsson so julie could take pics. say andy for probably the last time before he heads out to colorado...probably for good. he's a great guy and its been awesome racing against him for the last however many years. favorite memory...check out the picture of him and kyle sedore stopping to pose DURING a race like 4 years ago. during the pose i made my final pass and finished the last 2 miles of that race on a flat front tire. the only reason andy didn't pass me was because he rode the last 2 miles on a blown up wheel with only one break and a handful fewer spokes than one should. we still had enough time to stand at the finish and laugh about the way it ended while waiting for third place to come in a few minutes later. good luck in colorado.

mad barrier skills
finally catching fourth near the end of lap 5
run-up on lap 6...you're still f-ing there?!?!?! damnit.

fisty can fly!!

devil's cross race this sunday in bettendorf was an absolute riot. race recap soon.