Burned Again

Why, why, why does the Outlook WebApp hate me?  The fact that it doesn't bubble up the unread email indicators to parent folders has burned me so many times.

It goes something like this: End of the day, one final glance at my work email, nothing new to read...

...But oh no, expand the folder and notice that there are plenty of emails, addressed to me even, that for all my co-workers know, I've been willfully ignoring.

Maybe the better questions is why, why, why have I fallen for this multiple times?  Just expand the folder every morning when you log in dummy.

Project 29er: A Ride for the Bride

Don't shun the frumious Bandersnatch!

Back in the halcyon days of our early courtship, the Bride and I would, like many young couples, try to impress each other with various feats of wit, strength, charm, valor, and cooking. To demonstrate her strength the Bride took up mountain biking. To the FOMBA trails, the Fells, the White Mountains, and most remarkably of all, to Loon for lift-served riding we went. She liked being outside, liked the speed (to a point), but could never generate much enthusiasm for climbing.

Since the Bride doesn't generate a lot of power we are getting by with a 2x9 (24/32x11-26)

It couldn't last of course. After the first heady year of our relationship I kept riding, she did not. Hiking! That's it, we'd take up hiking together! Or running! Or cross country skiing! Or alpine skiing! Or tennis!

None of these really stuck either. Fast forward 15 years and I ride and race more than ever. It's a huge part of my life. I had long ago given up on any chance that the Bride would want to take up biking again.

Meow!

And then something happened. She wanted to go riding. We went a few times, very casually, with her riding my old Turner Burner. This bike isn't a good fit for her in many ways. It was very heavy, too tall, too long, and her 119 lbs. could barley budge the coil-sprung fork. Worst of all (to my mind) it is saddled with those tiny little toy 26" wheels.

One thing led to an another and suddenly the idea of a new bike for her came up. It was my idea of course, but it wasn't a very serious suggestion. But to my surprise she was enthusiastic. She went to a bike store and bought *TWO* new pairs of shorts and some socks, ON HER OWN! Sorry for the all-caps, but the Bride going to a bike store solo to buy something for herself is like the President personally putting air in the tires of his armored limo, "Agent Smith, the back left looks a little low. No, don't get up, I got it. Damn it, where is the extension cord for this compressor!"

Lot's of stand-over.

So which bike? A 29er without question. I had the Turner's nice kit to donate to the cause, so I only needed a frame, fork, and wheelset. But which frame? Full squishy? Nah, that would get a bit too pricey. So a hardtail, but what material? Aluminum? To harsh. Carbon? Too ridiculous for a newbie. Ti? Now we are talking, but still a bit too pricey. Steel? Let's see:

Affordable: Check
Comfortable: Check
Big Selection: Check
Old-school: Check
Superlight: Not so much

It's all about the custom touches at Temple Mountain Bikes (my fictions bike shop)

That's still a strong B average, so steel it was. But which frame? While I would have loved to buy a US-made boutique frame like a Siren Song 29, the frame-only prices for such rides blow my complete-bike budget out of the water like the Krakken attacking a rubber duck. That left the foreign made bikes; Surly Karate Monkey, Salsa El Mariachi, Voodoo Soukri, and the like.

The Highlights
Fork: 80mm Manitou Tower Expert
Wheels: Stan's Crests 29er
Drivetrain (other than cranks): XTR 9 speed
Cranks: Race Face ISIS Turbine
Tires: 2.25" Maxxis Ardents
Brakes: Avid Juicy 7
Grips: Ergon GP1-S
Saddle: Serfas ARC Ti

Yup, I reckon them's some big ole wheels.

I quickly settled on the Vassago Bandersnatch because their "Wet-Cat" geometry sounded perfect: slack head angle, longish stays, lot's of standover. In other words, stable like a supertanker.

A week and a half later there is a new member of the stable. Weather permitting the maiden voyage is tomorrow.

Not exactly a featherweight, but sane.
Not much to trim either, the bar, pedals, and
saddle are the only boat anchors.

Will the Bride being showing up soon at GTA rides soon, demanding a spot at the front? Will this bike be on eBay in two weeks? Somewhere in the middle? I hate to end on a cliche, but only time will tell.

2011 24 Hours of Great Glen

For the sixth time in the past seven years I returned to Pinkham Notch on the second weekend of August for yet another run at the 24 Hours of Great Glen. As was the case last year, my regular 2-man teammate Todd was spending another summer working on his new house and lacked the free time needed to train. Also like last year I didn't quite feel up to trying my hand as a solo competitor, so I joined a 4 man sport squad. Unlike last year where I raced with 3 randoms, this year I joined forces with my regular riding crony Curtis Lavoie, along with his friend from PA Francis Cuddy, and Temple NH's own force of nature/XC skier/road rider/trail runner Bob Treadwell.

Curt and Francis had coined the name 'Team Awesome!' as a spoof of the many 'extreme' and 'epic' type team names they had seen toiling at the back of the pack with matching jerseys at other races. We didn't have matching race jerseys, but courtesy of The Bride we did have matching t-shirts.

Sunday morning and still no rain.

A couple of weeks before the race Bob found out he had an unavoidable business trip the weekend of the race. Fortunately his son Bobby was ready and willing to fill in for him. This punted me clearly into the role of "old guy" on the team. And while Bob didn't have a lot of experience on a mountain bike, he was a veritable grizzled veteran compared to Bobby, who had all of 20-30 rides ever under his belt on race day. Potentially more worrisome was Bobby's choice of bike: A fully rigid 29er singlespeed with rim brakes. Having ridden a few times with Bobby I wasn't too concerned though, while still figuring out the finer points of technical riding, he could climb like an elevator and never seemed to get tired or discouraged.

Francis exits the plunge.
He's too big to ride this fast, but he does.

As always the weather was a concern; a lot of rain preceding the race and/or during the race makes for an "interesting" time. This year fate was kind, the course was dry and it only rained at the very end. The Bride and I headed up Friday night and setup our campsite then headed over to Gorham for the night. Being old I wanted to sleep in a real bed and take a hot shower before the race began.

In the weeks leading up to the race Curt and I had joked that we planned to win the sport class and take out as many expert teams as possible. He was feeling a bit ill the week before Great Glen and skipped the Top Notch Triathlon the week before to save himself, "for the race that matters" (This is an exact quote, exactly as I remember it at any rate).

Yup, he has a cotton shirt, a fully rigid singlespeed, and rim brakes.
Didn't matter.

Suffice it to say we were talking a lot of smack. When I saw that the number 2 and 3 sport teams from last year were registered I began to have my doubts. When the number of sport teams grew to 32 my doubts increased; that's a lot of teams to beat. When we showed up Saturday morning my doubts grew further yet. So many bad-ass looking racers, so many shaved legs, so many matching jerseys. How the hell could we beat these guys? We certainly didn't look like a contender, me with my Elvis Costello glasses and long travel trail bike, Bobby with cotton T-shirts, Walmart-special-looking ride and practically no riding experience, and Francis, well Francis had a great bike and appropriate kit, but he's 6'6" and 240lbs. No way a guy that big was going to survive multiple 8.3 miles laps with 1000' of climbing per lap. No way. Simply not possible. Admittedly Curt did look like he sort of belonged. He's got a giant tattoo, a Ti hardtail, and lots of fancy jerseys, but come on, those thick glasses...he's going to fog up an crash at 3:00 am.

I kept my doubts to myself, because everyone else seemed confident. I dispensed what little wisdom I'd picked up from doing this race previously. Mainly that advice was: Don't blow yourself up on the first lap and the race is won at night with consistent laps. Not sure if anyone was listening, not sure if it was even good advice, but I felt better saying something :-P

With my bum ankle we decided someone else should take the first lap. Since Bobby was on a singlespeed it didn't make much sense for him to go first and get caught up in the cattle call that is lap one. So first out duty fell to Francis, Curt was #2, Bobby was in the three spot, and I was last.

Curt on one of his early laps.

Noon. The cannon fires and 182 teams (including 12 hour teams and solos) started their running lap around the pond for the LeMans style start. Francis came through in the first quarter of racers and headed out on his Yeti Big Top. And then we waited.

The first racer in was from the sole pro team, coming in at a blistering 39:27. More riders came in each passing minute. Francis rolled in with a 47:10, putting us in 32nd position overall. I wasn't too worried though because we hadn't sent out our fastest guy first and sure enough when Curt turned a 41:32 lap we jumped to 19th position overall. Bobby's lap was 43:53 and brought us to 16th overall. Finally I got to head out and feeling good laid down a 42:27 which brought us to 11th overall and 2nd in the sport class.

The course was the usual mix of fast carriage road, rocky double track, and single track, with 100' of tarmac thrown in for good measure. It's fast, but you aren't going to win it on a cross bike, there's enough technical stuff to keep that from happening. There were a few reroutes, including the addition of a long switchback climb to the top of the plunge, which previously was a straight shot up the fall line. All-in-all if felt very familiar and it was easy to fall into a rythym (as well it should be given how many times I've raced here).

Yours Truly on the way to the top of the plunge.
The RIP 9 may not be the lightest bike, but it climbs like a champ and descends better.

Our gains on the overall came a bit slower after that but by the start of lap 10 we had moved into a narrow lead in the sport class and 6th overall. It didn't last long though as John Creedon from team 'Sucker Punch' threw down a 45:59 for lap 11, putting us almost 3 minutes back. Fortunately it's a team event, and as darkness fell, Sucker Punch's next rider managed only a 49:40 to my 44:23 (thanks in no small part to my ridiculous Niterider Pro 700 and Light & Motion Stella 600 which make keeping the pace in the dark a whole lot easier). We now had a 3 minute lead on Sucker Punch and 7 minute lead on Pure Adrenaline in third. We were still worried about Creedon's team, as has was clearly faster than any of us, but they were sending him out for double laps from the start of the race, which eventually had to take it's toll. We were committed to putting a fresh rider on course every lap and turning consistent lap times.

Through the night this strategy paid off, our fastest nighttime lap was 43:30 and our slowest was 48:32. By sunrise we had a 1 hour lead on Sucker Punch and 27 minute lead on the new 2nd place sport team, Team Adrenaline. Dumb luck played a part too of course; we had no serious mechanical issues and no crashes.

I knew what I was capable of and having ridden a lot with Curt he was delivering what I expected, but as the night wore on I was continually amazed at Francis and Bobby. How a guy as big as Francis continues to hit those climbs as fast as he did I'll never know. Bobby meanwhile decided he'd had enough of his rigid singlespeed with rim brakes, so upgraded to Curt's back up a bike, *another* singlespeed, this one had disc brakes though. If this kid decides to take up mountain bike racing watch out (I think Bobby doubled his lifetime mtb mileage during the race).

When the sun came up we knew it was our race to lose. When Francis headed out for lap 25 at 6:52 we were in 4th overall, with the sole Pro team, one expert team, and a 5 person team ahead of us. We went into crazy consistency mode, with our next 7 laps ranging from 46:37 to 47:53. When Bobby finished lap 31 at 11:34 am we knew we had won sport.

FEMA tent.

But let's back up a little. With the new rules this year we didn't need to have a racer on course at noon. We could call it a day at 11:34 and we knew that it would be impossible for any other sport team to get another rider out in time to attempt a 32nd lap. We clarified this with the race administrators, but I felt a bit guilty. The rest of my team had each done 8 laps, who was I to do only 7? While we thought about what to do it started to rain. Really hard. I didn't come to race to race the 23 Hours and 34 minutes of Great Glen. So when we spotted Bobby across the field I knew I was going out one more time.

It's all over, so we can smile now.

It was a formality and I didn't take any chances. I walked twice for the first time in the race, at the top of the first climb across the bridge and down the plunge at the end. I wasn't entirely sure if I crashed out here and DNFed if we would still be ruled the winners, so I played the slow-by-easy card. It was a bit disappointing to break the 50 minute mark for our team, but discretion, valor and all that.

Fastest laps? No. Consistent laps? Yes

As usual the awards took too long, with useless raffles and too many classes (e.g. Sport ;-). How the solo competitors didn't run from the tent screaming "I'M REALLY @!#$% TIRED AND WANT GO TO SLEEP!!!" I'll never know.

Not sure if this group will be back next year. If the other guys want to defend I'm game, or maybe I'll finally try my luck as a solo.

The Pinnacle

I don't race much, but when I do it's typically longer stuff, 24 Hours of Great Glen, Hampshire 100, 12 Hours of Bradbury Mountain, etc. This past Sunday I tried something a bit shorter, one of the Eastern Fat Tire Association's New England Championship Series races: The Pinnacle XII (#4 on this year's calendar).

The race was held in scenic Newport NH, a town I'm familiar with mostly from my motorcycling days as it lies in the western part of the state which is short on traffic and police and long on twisty roads.

The sport class raced three laps for a total of 13.6 miles (per my Garmin Forerunner). The course was listed at 16 miles for sport, but apparently some adjustments were made from last year. Weather was off-the-charts perfect. Dry, sunny, breezy, and warm but not hot; a perfect day in the mountains.

The Sport Class Course

Among my regular crew of riders there were two others competing: My 24 Hours of Great Glen teammate Curt and first-time MTB racer Jeff. Jeff deserves credit for showing up since he's still saddled with a toy bike with those adorable little 26" wheels. (To his credit he has a Ti 29er on order). "Big" Chris showed up to provide support with his lawn chair and umbrella, and sadly also with his plaster cast encasing his repaired foot. Pretty sure he would have given those young guys in the Clydesdale class some competition had he been riding.

I had no idea what the course was like, particularly how much climbing there was. Curt had gathered a little info and was under the impression that there was a good deal of up right away. Since that was all I had to go on I figured I'd take it easy out of the gate.

That Sport and Novice riders started in waves at 9:30 on a grassy field at the Newport High School. The climbing started at about 9:31.

It's either up or down on this course: 1905' of climbing

The climb while not crippling steep, was almost all single track and fairly technical in few spots. Nothing you'd worry about during a fun ride, but when packed with over-eager racers and your blood is pumping it made for a few interesting moments as the rider at the head of the line spun out or tumbled and everyone behind came to a screeching halt. I made a few passes on the way up, but lost almost all I gained when the rider in front of me crashed and laid his bike out across the trail causing me to dismount. I figured discretion was the better part of valor at this point and just focused on getting to the top without any more incidents, though my caution meant just about everyone in the Vet II class passed me.

I was feeling I might have brought a bit too much bike with my Niner RIP 9, but those thoughts evaporated when the course turned down. The descent was almost all single track and featured numerous monstrous berms (monstrous for a XC race anyhow). I've never seen so many crashes in a race before. One rider flew off the top of a berm and into the trees (and I assume onto the rocks supporting the berm). Several overcooked the numerous tight turns and laid it down. A few pivoted violently around their front axles and drilled themselves into the dirt.

The descent ended with a plunge down a gravel slope onto a grass field. Sadly I can't find a decent picture of it, but the terror of it is clear in my mind's eye. Well maybe "terror" is an exaggeration, but you really wanted to be sure you were lined up straight when you hit it, because mid-course corrections on the way down were likely to result in a DNF.

The second and third laps were extended versions of the first (5 miles vs. 3.6 miles). At the start of the second lap the racers were thinned out so I started chasing down everybody I'd let by before. My legs felt good so I upped the pace a little bit and was soon passing quite a few folks (well maybe my pace stayed the same and they were wilting...same thing really). Most passing had to be done on the climbs, the downhills were just too fast and tight to squeeze by all but the slowest racers. Didn't matter much as I was more concerned with staying upright on the descents.

The remainder of the race was pretty uneventful until the very end. On the final descent I was in the 3 spot of a tightly packed group of 4 riders. I recognized one of them from the start of my class, so I had it in mind to pass him at the finish. The guy behind me wanted to pass, but we were flying along and that simply wasn't in the cards. I cursed myself for not climbing harder since I was constantly braking more than I wanted as the two in front of me slowed for corners. I'm no downhill guru, but a RIP 9 with 2.2" Nevegals can carry a lot of speed compared to the typical hardtail XC race bike. Didn't matter though because there was no way I was going to squeeze by. Then it really didn't matter as we crossed the last bridge and my back wheel clipped a root hard, kicking my back wheel into the air. I road a brief nose wheelie across the bridge before riding right off it. The guy behind me got his wish and passed, though he did ask if I was alright. The bike and I were unscathed from the crash, we landed upright and my pride was the most serious injury. I confess to being a bit irate and hauled myself out of the ditch and threw caution to the wind in an effort to catch back up. My bike was all over the place but I managed to catch them right was we came out onto the final stretch of double track and the clearing at the top of the final plunge. I was in an ok spot to make a move, but futzed the line on the plunge: Thinking I could go right and pass them on down slope, instead I found soft sand and lost speed and all three finished ahead of me.

Oh well, I can't care too much, caring too much about your mid-pack finishing order means you are either racing elite class or you need to relax.

The Overall Sport Class Men's Results (6 DNFs)

While I was mildly disappointed with my finish, Curt did very well, finishing first in his class and 5th overall. Jeff did well too, finishing with a comfortable lead in the Novice Vet II class.

* This first place puzzles me. This racer finished the 2nd, 3rd, and 3rd in the first three NECS races...in the Novice class. Suddenly he's putting 15 minutes on the next closest sport racer, over a 13.6 mile course?! Bad data? Sandbagger? Most improved rider ever? Anybody know the deal?

Calling Tech Support

People often ask how I like working at home or skip the question and go right on to expressing their envy. All-in-all it's quite nice and certainly any pro/con analysis is heavily weighted to the pro side of the ledger. One of the few drawbacks is that you are your own tech support. Most of the time this isn't a big deal: install some software, setup a simple home network, update your OS.

Today though was one of those days where it all went to $#!t...

Keeping my Cisco Linksys E3000 from cooking itself

XTerra Upgrade

I've kept my 2008 Nissan XTerra Off Road pretty much stock. It's as capable off-road as I'll ever need so I've never been tempted by the long list of dirt toys like those from ShrockWorks (though I'd be lying if I said a winch bumper hasn't tempted me; there's been many a time I would have liked to have one).

I also got my truck with pretty much every factory installed option. The Rockford Fosgate head unit, amp, speakers, and sub, while not perfect, is good enough that I was never tempted to upgrade anything. iPod integration is so cumbersome as to be pointless without a passenger to do it, but at least it's there (and addressing that would require a new head unit).

The one thing that has bugged me though is the lack of a factory installed nav unit. I'm quite happy with my little Garmin Nuvi 260w, but I'm not found of the ugly window mount and the power cord with constantly gets tangled and obscures the head unit. I am also paranoid about leaving it in the cradle while I leave the truck; it's a tempting smash-and-grab item.

Now you see me.

Now you don't.

While researching new nav head units I discovered that Nissan offers a dealer installed GPS housing. It's nothing very fancy, just a flip-up clam shell holder for a Garmin 7xx series. The nice part is that it's (obviously) a lot cheaper than something like this. And given my disinclination to mess with the rest of the system, it was a no-brainer. Finding the old style model (for the 2005-2008 dash) proved quite difficult though. I finally found one at mynismo.com.

Installation took about 1 hour, though it would take significantly less if you already know your way under the dash. The wiring harness included a tap for the head unit's power wire, which was nice, but the tap itself is very fragile and dropping it into the bowels of the dash is a real possibility.

My old Nuvi doesn't work with the cradle so I needed to pick up a new Nuvi 765T. Haven't had much of a chance to play with it yet, but I applaud Garmin for not changing the UI too much simply to give the appearance of improvement.

The only real problem in the install was that when I disconnected the battery, the VDC system "resets" (i.e. is disabled). The reset procedure is to simply drive straight for a while over 10 m.p.h., but so far that hasn't worked. I have to give Nissan an F on that one, a vehicle like this desperately needs stability control, and making the reset procedure require driving seems an odd choice.

Basketball Jones[1]

Uh-oh

About five or six years ago I hung up my sneakers for good.

Or so I thought.

I had "retired" once before, after a crushing elbow to the face in the late 90's. It was the wise choice I thought. My left ankle was, and continues to be, a non-flexible mass of bone chips, scar tissue, duct tape, and gravel. My fingers had been jammed and hyper-extended more times than I could remember. It was time to be an adult, time to pursue adult sports like tennis and golf.

During that first hiatus I already considered myself primarily a mountain biker, runner, and skier. Individual, outdoor sports. They were better suited to my stengths. Hoops? I had long arms. That was the complete list of my roundball assets. I lacked explosive speed, my hands are on the left side of the dwarf->Rondo continuum, and the days of getting up to the rim were gone by the time I was 25.

My jumper sucked; I was a 6' 175 lb. guy who played in the post and never met a drive he didn't like. But after getting hammered for too long in the paint I decided it was time to quit.

Retirement #1 didn't stick of course. Once I moved to NH and was in grad school I started up again. It was basically free entertainment, an important consideration for a grad student. I hadn't quit mountain biking, but was only a casual participant, my first real racing was a couple of years off. The trail running bug hadn't bit. It was good exercise.

But the teens and 20-somethings at the playground were getting so much faster and stronger (though I realize now, of course, that I was getting slower and weaker). The injuries took even longer to heal.

Why go on with a young man's game?

So I hung em up once again. Stopped checking the weather to see if it was raining at the playground, stopped working on that spin and lefty scoop shot move, stopped nursing a laundry list of nagging injuries. It was hard to let go, but I didn't t want to be that creepy old guy at the gym with googles and white socks.

So when the Bride recently brought me news of an old-guy's game in a nearby town, I should have said, "Interesting, but those days are behind me." Instead the UPS man brought me a new ankle brace and some shiny new kicks today. It might be a bad idea, but time to see if anything is left in the tank.

[1] For you youngsters, but be warned it's from 1974 and isn't very PC.

365 Songs: №. 22

365 Songs lives!

Barely.

It's more undead than actually alive. I'm changing the tagline from "Day X" to "№ X" because obviously I've failed miserably at providing a daily entry.

Anyhow, I do have enough time for song 22. After a less-then-stellar day at work I was wallowing in a bit of self-pity. I came upstairs in a foul mood. Then I remembered what time of year it is and broke out Capitol Record's 2004 compilation "Christmas Classics". I went right for track 2, Dean Martin's perfect 1959 version of Frank Loesser's "Baby It's Cold Outside":



Now that improved my mood considerably! Time to listen to the rest of it.

Thanks

The KRA auction was a great success last night. There are a lot of people to thank, but this note is to our friends who are not part of the organization:

First a very special thanks to two who went above and beyond: Bruce Cobb, our auctioneer and Paul Vaillancourt, our DJ and MC for the raffle. Without these pros at the microphone this event doesn't get pulled off, plain and simple.

Josée Dupont, who not only donated to the auction but bid up a storm. She showed how it's done at a charity auction -- it's not about finding a deal, it's about supporting a cause, and it's about making bids, not sitting on your hands.

Who are you going to call when you want a reliable and enthusiastic attendee to your event? Kelly Giard, that's who. She's the kind of person a bystander on the street sees going into an event and thinks, "Hey, where is she going? It looks like it might be fun".

What do you call a person who secured passage from Spain this week, without a passport or any money, after getting robbed, while on vacation, just so she could attend this event? You call that person a friend of the highest quality or Francesca LaSala Cobb.

Kevin and Stephanie Hirnak, where to start with these two? Whether paying the optional $50 donor ticket price or throwing around some of the biggest bids of the night, they just plain got it done.

Pat Terry for securing a Crotched Mountain season pass for the live auction. That's the kind of item that generates bids.

Matt Waitkins and Tracey Bowman, whose schedule didn't permit them to attend, but made sure the check really was in the mail.

To paraphrase Harry Bailey, we feel like the richest folks in town.

Moving Pictures

While I've owned a high definition camcorder for a long time I've never used it much. Too fragile for first person use while skiing or mountain biking. I recently acquired a GoPro HD Hero helmet camera. Now this is more like it. Tiny and robust. Cheap enough that in the unlikely event I completely destroy it, I'll only cry for 20 minutes.

Still getting my feet wet with the camera's features and taking the tiniest of baby steps with editing, but I'm having fun.

FOMBA Hemlock Loop Trail from pburba on Vimeo.

This was my first video, it's too long and consists of only one scene. Only singletrack junkies are likely to find it enjoyable. Critical lessons learned:

• The seatpost is the place to mount the camera for smooth video, especially if you stay seated.

• The strap-on helmet mount produced nothing by jiggly footage that will have you reaching for the Dramamine.

Bear Brook from pburba on Vimeo.

This is my second video. Actually have several different scenes and it is slightly less boring. Switched from Adobe Premier Elements to TrakAxPC Pro, which is half the cost and twice as good.