Vamos pa' México hermano

Pampa

Well-Known Member
2019 Bikepacking trip

The couple of years after my first attempt at this race (2016), I wanted to do it again, mainly to get rid of that feeling of unfinished business that came after I quit. Later I realized that wasn't a reason good enough to tackle this again, so I set out to find out if I still wanted to do this for the riding, the adventure, etc. - kind of starting from a blank page.

In August 2019 my wife drove me to Pinedale, WY, where I quit the first time, and I did ~400 miles of the route in 4.5 days. This was a good test because one of the reasons I quit at Pinedale, was not to ride through the Great Basin - a stretch of ~180 mi with nothing but a little village about mid point on the route. It turns out I did enjoy riding this stretch of land. It doesn't have any outstanding features, no single track, and it's wide open, but that's what makes it unique. After that, I got into Colorado and I had plans to go to the border of CO and NM, but bad saddle sores had me quit passing Steamboat.

Anyway, after this trip I was convinced I wanted to do this again. I also tested a new rig that I like very much - a 29+ frame with 3" tires.

Some pics:

The bike
La Mula 1.JPG


The Great Basin
Great Basin 1.JPG


Great Basin 2.JPG


Great Basin 3.JPG


One of very few water sources - extra purifying tablets for this :)
One of very few water sources.JPG


Camping at Lynx Pass CO
Camping at Lynx Pass CG.JPG
 

Pampa

Well-Known Member
2020 - Inconsistent training/preparation, but still somewhat useful as base?

Last year it was the first year I followed a structured training program (two, in fact), and I trained with power. I had to do a lot of rides on the trainer (all the intervals work) but I did notice a significant improvement in my fitness. My goal was to do the Colorado Trail Race; another bikepacking race that's tough in a different way than the TD (540 mi, +70K of climbing). It has more climbing per mile, more ST (and some of that technical), and it climbs higher than the TD route. I wanted to this race instead of the TD because it takes less time to do it, less money, and the logistics were very simple for me since I live 40 min from the start and 5 hrs from the finish line.

This race was canceled due to COVID when I was half way through my second training program. Without any bike races available, I switched to running since I found a trail race in August that look like good endurance builder for biking later on (I have no idea if this is true actually, but it was a close by, relatively cheap and a long race - 50 miler). Two months into my training for that, that race was cancelled too, also because of COVID. At that point I was doing double long runs on the weekend and got up to 16 and 19 miles on Sat/Sun.

After that I set my sights on the 2021 TD and started to put together a new bike, doing long rides and trying stuff (overnight rides without tent, different ways to carry water, etc.). In September I did a couple of long rides that gave me confidence I could get to the race in decent shape if I kept it up. A 10 hr, 100 mi, +12K ride, and a 2-day 150 mi, 17 hr, +15K ride.

Between September and November I did nothing at all (work situation, stress, etc.), and according to Training Peaks I lost all fitness I built in the year. Then, in December I decided to hire a coach for 2021 to keep me on track and hold me accountable on the training, and spent that month preparing to get started in the new year.

Some pics:

New bike, old gear
New_bile_-_old_gear.jpg


Overnighter - snow at the pass
Rollins_Pass_1.jpg


Trestle bridge
Tressle_2.jpg


Clear night
Winter_Park.jpg


Morning after bivvying
Bivvying.jpg
 

rottin'

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Segundo I love reading this stuff. Glad you are taking a second crack at this, and with some "actual" training for this one. With better fitness and now the previous attempt's experiences, I expect a much better result on this attempt...which could mean finishing it, it could mean going farther than last time, it could mean being able to enjoy the miles you do get in better, less catastrophic mechanicals, etc. Whatever "that" is, you are already going into this one from a much better position of strength it seems.
 

Pampa

Well-Known Member
Jan 2021
This part of the training/preparation is pretty boring (to read about anyway), so I figure I’d post a summary of the month. I’m breaking down my training & preparation in five categories.

Physical training
I started training with a coach in Jan. It took a few weeks to adjust but I’m learning to trust him and actually follow his advice. The first weeks I overshoot a lot of the training sessions. I kept thinking “I hired a coach so he’d work me to death and he’s telling me to rest more, eat more and sleep more!”. After two weeks of overtraining (plus having a head start on my own before starting with him instead of resting), I couldn’t keep it up so I finally took a break a reset.

The last two weeks have been much better, although I occasionally still push a bit more than prescribed. I’m just used to gauge my progress by the amount of training accumulated, and when I see that number going down, I get nervous. I started doing VO2 Max intervals and "Sweet Spot Training" rides.

TP Fitness snapshots.png
Time in HR Zones by week.png


I also started doing weights for legs. Another disappointment when I remember what I could lift just 2 years ago but I'm getting around my new "base" and looking at progress from there. Right now I'm squatting 3 x 8 w/ 135 lb after 3 sets of warmup. Two years ago I was doing 245 lb (assuming the bar on the Smith machine is 45 lbs).


Bike
I put in a new fork and tried a couple of combinations of stems and handlebars. I need to settle on this before moving on to other parts of the cockpit and rest of the bike. I’m pretty happy with the handlebar I have now, but I need a really long ride (>5 hrs) to see if my hands are happy or if they get numb.

IMG_7809.jpg
IMG_7811.jpg



Gear
Got a new dry bag for the rear. The material is absolutely waterproof and bomb proof but I’m not loving the narrow bottom. I’ll probably keep it once I figure out a good way to pack in it.

IMG_7816.jpg



Route planning/logistics
I haven’t done anything in this section this month. I have time though.


Bikepacking practice (overnights, camping, riding in unknown places, etc.)
This is very important but not priority right now. Will probably start these outings in March.


On another note, it's not clear if the race is going to happen this year. The chatter is that there might be a "shorter" race, starting at the US-Canada border (Roosville, 10 miles north of Eureka, MT) since Canada is not allowing traveling from the US for recreational purposes. If this is the case, or if the race doesn't happen, I'll go to plan B, which is the Colorado Trail Race. This one has confirmed the start and it's lower risk because it's all in the Colorado state.
 

Patrick

Overthinking the draft from the basement already
Staff member
Well done!

approaching 100 miles right now - in the top 30
 

Patrick

Overthinking the draft from the basement already
Staff member
over 200 miles!!! approaching 1/2 way

HUGE effort.

Keep pedaling!
 
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