We Will Miss You Mountain Bike Mondays

 Hey there,

  So I don’t even know how to thank you all so much for the very generous gift!! I actually don’t take gifts very well.. My cheeks turn red and usually I start to cry.. Yeah well Mark read me the card after the BBQ  and  it all happened. You are all so awesome and I couldn’t have asked for a better summer to end with in Breck!! I love you and hope next summer you will start your own MBM’s!! I want to hear all about the crashes and do overs. Those are the best… seeing you all cheering each other on like a bunch of cheerleaders. I was waiting for the pom poms and front flips Really thank you again for the unforgettable summer!!

E

Wilderness 101… DNF and a New Perspective

After I gave these Dakine gloves to Jeremy I think he wore them for a week straight. This is why I ride my bike. This isn't staged really!! So funny!

 

This is way better than a petting zoo. This is why I ride my bike.

 

A super hard day that I didn't want to forget...this is why I ride my bike.

 

This is Mark. My husband. Nine years this Aug. He is why I ride my bike.

 

One of the girls from Mountain Bike Mondays. They are riding things they never thought in a million years they would ride. This is why I ride my bike.

 

Some of them want to hit the bike park... BC? Maybe? This is why I ride my bike.

 

If you hang out with me long enough we will get lost. This is why I ride my bike.

 

Just when I think I have it all figured out… I am reminded how small I really am. This is why I ride my bike.

I have had this written for weeks now but I am just now at the point of publicly publishing it… I’m not for sure how much to let you all in. My head that is. Why did I start racing? It was Montezumas Revenge. My first solo 24 hour race ever. I never go with “entry level” whatever that really means. I like to experience the “impossible” and go from there. Everything is easier from there.

Sure I fell in love with the challenges. The amazing acts of humanity. The friendships.The fight. I was also losing the things most important to me. It has been a long time coming. This season every race was the last and I couldn’t shake it. I found myself just wanting the things back that made me,  me. I felt like I was fighting against what ”The Plan” for my life was and I was dragging my heels. The truth of it was I did not like racing… I loved the journey and the rest of the package. The idea of racing on new terrain was exciting and still is…

The 101 took place in Coburn PA. A beautiful area with insane, lush, green single track. The trip out was pretty painless. I couldn’t ask for a better traveling partner. A good friend of mine. Someone who stops at every Starbucks because you never know when there will be another in the great state of Kansas. Who stops EVERTIME I have to use the restroom   Who doesn’t make me talk much, unless I want to.  Yeah I had a great traveling partner. 

I was excited for the race. I have done this course before and loved it. It started out with the normal neutral start and Chris Scott on the horn. Pua, Sue, Cheryl, Betsy and a handful of locals I didn’t recognize but knew they were fast,  were all up in front. Really that is all I really remember. The next 20 miles were incredibly surreal for me. Something had snapped. I wanted out. I just wanted to ride my bike… not race my bike. All of a sudden I started to think about Mark and how I haven’t really seen him in 3 years. Except in-between my tired spells and the cup of coffee in the morning. He does not care what I do or what I have accomplished… He just wants me.  That is what counts when I am 80. How I didn’t remember the last time I really rode my bike because I loved it. I wanted to rent a downhill bike and ride a chairlift up Keystone resort. I wanted to learn how to ride a fixie. First I needed the money for the fixie. How I rode around Lake Tahoe twice which from my house was 180 miles… just because. That is what I used to do. I would map out a “what if I can’t ride this” and conquer it. There was no finish line. It never occurred to me to let anyone else know that I was putting in back to back centuries.  Then  I was thinking of how I wanted to go shopping again. How I loved live music and I used to write.How much I love to paint. How I didn’t really care if so and so beat me… I was actually excited for them. How I needed to have time goals for races because it never came down to the “competition” for me.

At that moment I stopped… took a breath and looked up. Even though I had been here before, I had never really seen it before and it took my breath away. Everything around me was beautiful and I almost missed it. At that moment I rode to mile 40 and dropped out. All I wanted to do was ride. I wasn’t tired in the least bit. I saw my friend Harlan, shed some tears and we went for a soul searching ride. It was exactly what I needed.

Then I saw the winners come through. I am always out on course when the winning men come through. I have to be honest what I experienced here was well a good dose of reality. These men had just CRUSHED  the course. They were very tired and muddy. The crowd at the end was very small. Mostly people they knew. That’s when I realized I am not chasing my dream.  I am chasing someone else’s dream. I know I can finish these races. I have been top 3 90% of the time in the last 3 years… top 5 the other %.  I have drained my bank account multiple times. Traveled many miles without Mark between training starting in Feb and racing. I then asked myself what is it that you love about this sport?? Erika what is it because it is not this.

I head to Fruita and Moab multiple times of the year. They are second homes to me really. You know what I thrive on? The little girl I ride by and I hear her squeal “Daddy that is a GIRL!!” Then I turn around and spend 5 minutes with her just to go down the slightest hill. She will never know my name or what I do on a daily basis. The girl I pass in Moab who is with her boyfriend and clearly close to tears. Just to spend a mile with her and give her the confidence… because if a girl like me can do it so can she.  Jeremy who is getting a BMX bike and might be the NEXT.A girl from Brazil wanted to learn how to ride a bike and send a picture to her family back home. She learned on my 1950’s fold up Dahon bike!! How I love Mountain Bike Mondays. Riding the White Rim… in a day… half of it at night…12 hours. All the “epics” I can’t even name. I miss the Montezumas Revenges… Those are the races I miss. Survival… and doing the “impossible”.

I have lived at least 10 different lives since probably the age of 17. I’m pretty sure in about 5 years someone will ask what I did in Breckenridge and the conversation will come up that I raced 24 hour races and they will look at me just like some people do now. With the look of seriously?? But you just don’t look like the type… That’s when I will walk over to another registration table and put down way too much money, walk up to another starting line for the Lemond’s run and ask myself at 2 o’clock in the morning, “ What in the heck are you doing”??       Because that is what I do.

After Moab I am about to start another life. I will still ride my bike in amazing places and the GDR sure looks like it is right down my ally. I have been told I have an ally… it keeps getting longer and more complicated these days. I have been painting. We are about to move to the NW in December.  Maybe I will go from a starving cyclist to a starving artist who will pull out the topos and map out the “what if I can’t do it” ride..then pull up to a wine bar/coffee shop… maybe just maybe it will be in another country where even if I wanted to tell someone about the “epic” today, they wouldn’t understand me… Mark would understand me though, because he was there for the entire ride…Now that is right down my alley.

Mountain Bike Monday’s for Aug and Sept

Hey there,

 So we are having two more Mondays for the season. We will be riding one Monday and finishing off with a BBQ the other.

Monday the 31st we will be meeting in Dillon at Lord of the Mountains Church.  5:30 both beginners and intermediates.

Monday Sept 7th we will be at my house. Even if you have not made many of these you are very welcome to come. The food is always amazing. It will be a potluck. If you decide to come let me know and I will let you know what to bring. It will be fun. That is Labor Day. We will start food  up around 6:00. This is just not for the girls but please leave the pups at home… as most of you know we live right next to the road.

See you all soon.

E

Monday Aug 10

Hey there,

So Beginners at 4:30 will be meeting at the Dredge off of Tiger Road.

Intermediates will also be meeting at the Dredge off of Tiger Road at 6:15.

I’m going to show you both some loops you can ride from there over to Keystone Ranch. See you all tomorrow!!

E

Bike Maintenance Tuesday Aug 4

Hey there… This is getting out extremely late and I am sorry about that!! So tomorrow night we are meeting at Beaver Run. The first parking off to the left. We will be meeting at 5:00. If you could bring things to change a flat tire that would be great and if you don’t have anything we will head to a bike store for a field trip. We will be riding a little bit also. Hope you all had a good week!!

E

Wilderness 101

Josh and I will be heading to State College, PA on Wednesday for the Wilderness 101. One more 22 hour drive to the east coast for the year and then we will stay in the west.  The course has a ton of single track, skinny single track. Can’t wait!

Dream

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Ride on Monday July 27

Hi there I hope you all had a good week!!

Beginners We will be meeting and parking at the Country Boy Mine at 4:30.

Intermediates will be meeting at at Sally Barber trail head at 6:15.

See you all then!!

E

Breck 100 hmmm… Excuses v. to free from blame

I think that is a perfect title to this little number. My definition to excuses v. something said that your competition won’t believe and your friends won’t need. I could go on and on about this race and in fact I keep pulling a “girl” with anyone who will listen. Right now you boys are wondering what a “girl” is. That is the act of when a female all of a sudden out of no where talks WITHOUT a filter and a broken STOP button, forgets to breathe for at least 20 minutes, interrupting, trying to make her point about why her day or race was awful. If  you are a man caught in this wake you will need a translator or you can go to your happy place and keep looking at her with adoring eyes, zone out and just keep saying sorry… That’s pulling a “girl”. If tears show up or her eyes start to dilate that’s the next level of “crazy” girl. Don’t get the two mixed up! If you see “crazy” start to show… I’m sorry.

So I am not going to play the excuse game and just say I will do better next time.  I am going to be happy with my 3rd place finish. Now lets talk about the race itself.

First of all I had coffee with Danielle Musto the day before the race. I am so glad I did. I have only raced with Danielle so it was nice to get to know her in street clothes. I loved being able to tell her about the course and what to expect. She did an amazing  job and I have to tell you what this girl endured. First of all the course is not always marked well.  She had heard that and  was more worried about getting lost then the actual race. Second she came from Michigan which I think is actually below sea level AND she finished this race after throwing up multiple times. I think she probably had altitude sickness. Which is horrible!!  I truly believe the biggest inspiration you can give someone is courage. To me courage is conquering something when your fight or flight response is on full gear. Fatigue will make a coward out of anyone and she fought through it. She showed courage. This girl flys on a bike so to see her in the end so sick and just trying to stay in the game… I have to say was inspirational.

The course had changed since the years past. More single track which I did appreciate. It was a beautiful day and the 6:00 start was the warmest it has ever been. The day was why I call Breckenridge home. We started climbing up the ski area service road to 12,300 ft. That is not a typo. I live at 10,000 feet so we always go up. The trees disappear about 11,000 feet. There really is not enough oxygen for them to live above that. I thrive on the single track up there though. It’s more like a goat trail. Only about 5 inches wide…enough for their little feet to run. You know what I mean. Then we headed over the Wheeler trail and that’s where my tires take on a mind of their own.  Training with my mud tires and racing on my slicks is the difference between carob and real dark chocolate. You always truly want the the real thing. But when you get the real thing it’s even better.  My AT’s are the carob and the “slicks” are the 90% dark chocolate. They are that good.  Then we head back to Breck on the Peaks trail. Loop 1   29 miles    3,560 Feet Elevation Gain

We in Breckenridge like to climb really more then going down or that is what I tell myself EVERYTIME I do this race Climb Climb Climb next we get to Little French and on any normal day this is a piece of cake for me but not this day. I make it almost to the top of a wider goat trail with A LOT of rocks littering the trail and I finally succumb to hiking but not before I turn around to the line of men behind me with their shoulders rolled over, asking themselves WHY they payed for this and how can they get a ride back to the beer AND where in the heck is the top and I proceed to tell them that I have climbed this hill about  22 times in 8 years and I don’t feel the need to do it again after this race. That I needed witnesses to what I was saying. I’m already eating my words. Because once I got to the top and rode down American Gulch with giant berms I already forgot about the promise I had made. I’m sure I lost time trying to play how high can I get on the berms game… Thayne added Westridge this year. Remember we like to go up in Breckenridge. As I was falling apart at the seams I kept telling myself that I was going to go down the BEST single track on the Colorado trail and I should be happy because I knew where the top was More climbing and some road. Loop 2   32 miles   4,268 Feet Elevation Gain

Then more climbing and more climbing Blue River trail, Indiana Gulch to Boreas Pass, down Gold Dust Trail to Como and up through Tarryall campgrounds to Boreas Pass, down Bankers Tank, down Aspen Tunnel. Loop 3  36 miles   4,321 Feet Elevation Gain

 I made some inflexible mistakes but you race and you learn. At the end of the day I could have  been smarter and still finished in third. Ester and Sonya were amazing!!  I could go all day about the competitors. There were  tons of friends. Amazing  support. Mark wouldn’t have missed it for anything. The Bach brothers were there!! All that combined just makes this race such a bittersweet success.

Now I am on to the next venture and I am so excited. J and I are headed to Wilderness 101 in a week or so.  The land of abundant oxygen  and great terrain. Even when the oxygen is plenty it  doesn’t mean the hills are smaller or the terrain easier. It’s still 100 miles at the end of the day. I definitely won’t be taking it easy.

THIS is why we all should be single speeders…

Oh if only the world were full of single speeders...