So the recovery days have been a bit frustrating, but not riding has given me the chance to recharge my batteries a little bit. After spending a day in Canmore watching the team relay event and icing my knee a lot, I had a big dinner with Peter Wellsman and drove north up through Banff National Park and camped at the bottom of the Athabasca Glacier in the Columbia Ice Fields. It was amazing. Not super cold, but really quiet. When you don't have TV or internet it seems like time slows down.
Getting up the next morning I drove to Edmonton with a little stop in Jasper to walk through town and grab lunch. My speed was very inconsistent on the drive because I'd get distracted by how massive the mountains were and then realize I was only doing 80, so I'd get it back up to 120 and then gradually slow back down. Driving right through the Rocky Mountains is amazing. I saw another black bear too which brings my bear-tally to three on this trip.
After getting into Edmonton I got a tour of Roddi's place and picked my room for the rest of the week. Now I'm just picking at all of my scabs and telling Roddi that I'll feed them to his cats if they keep bothering me.
Other than that not much is new. I sampled some of Roddi's chocolate Cheerios which I would give a 7.5/10, and now I am going to try to warm up my knee so that I can check out the Canada Cup course this afternoon.
The good part about not riding much is it's allowed me to put on a little extra weight for Mongolia. I think after riding 1200k in nine days I'm going to look like I just escaped from Aushwitz when I get back home.
Thursday, 21 July 2011
Saturday, 16 July 2011
The Trough
Over the course of a racing season there are often peaks and troughs; high points and low points; good races and crappy races. Or no races. I drove to Canmore a week ago to race MTB Nationals which were today, but I didn't start the race because I crashed yesterday in pre-ride and my knee swelled up to the point that I couldn't bend it. I'd been riding the course all week and probably put in 7-8 laps thinking that this was going to be my best nationals yet, but one stupid slip on a technical section just before heading home ended my weekend of riding early.
I didn't think the fall was that bad at the time. It hurt, and my knee smashed a big rock fairly hard, but I thought it was just superficial and it would be good to go after cleaning up a bit of blood. When I got back to where I was staying, I iced and elevated my knee, but it swelled up like crazy. When I got up in the morning it was even worse, and I was hobbling around like a pirate.
I tried to start. Tara Baker wrapped up my knee super pro like Johnny Hoogerland, but I couldn't stand up on the pedals and was only able to spin lightly after 60 min of warming up. In a year that I have proclaimed this 'the summer of Tom', so far this is the low point.
In trying to be mentally strong and look for the positives in a negative situation, I have only found one. Marty Lazarski told me afterwards that this would make me stronger, but it won't. Not racing is not training and the people who raced today will gain fitness from pushing themselves. The only way I will gain from this is in the long term. The reason I crashed is because I was trying to ride this technical section faster than I did in earlier laps. I wanted to improve and consciously push myself to ride it faster. Realizing that I was doing this is the only bit of encouragement that I will take from this.
I'm a little bummed out. But on a more positive note, a lot of my friends and training partners had great races and it was good to cheer them on and give them weak pushes from my one good leg. I'm already looking forward to nationals next year.
I didn't think the fall was that bad at the time. It hurt, and my knee smashed a big rock fairly hard, but I thought it was just superficial and it would be good to go after cleaning up a bit of blood. When I got back to where I was staying, I iced and elevated my knee, but it swelled up like crazy. When I got up in the morning it was even worse, and I was hobbling around like a pirate.
I tried to start. Tara Baker wrapped up my knee super pro like Johnny Hoogerland, but I couldn't stand up on the pedals and was only able to spin lightly after 60 min of warming up. In a year that I have proclaimed this 'the summer of Tom', so far this is the low point.
In trying to be mentally strong and look for the positives in a negative situation, I have only found one. Marty Lazarski told me afterwards that this would make me stronger, but it won't. Not racing is not training and the people who raced today will gain fitness from pushing themselves. The only way I will gain from this is in the long term. The reason I crashed is because I was trying to ride this technical section faster than I did in earlier laps. I wanted to improve and consciously push myself to ride it faster. Realizing that I was doing this is the only bit of encouragement that I will take from this.
I'm a little bummed out. But on a more positive note, a lot of my friends and training partners had great races and it was good to cheer them on and give them weak pushes from my one good leg. I'm already looking forward to nationals next year.
Wednesday, 13 July 2011
Best riding in the world!
Oh man some good times have definitely been had the past few days! On Wednesday night I drove up to Squamish after a quick stop in Vancouver to look for a place to live for September. Then after being super excited to see everyone at BCBR and them being way too tired not to care that I was there, I guest-rode the stage with Tanya Berg and her Belgian challenger (who had a nice solid crash which led to some good wimpering mixed with hard breathing).
I was planning on showing Tanya some good lines down the descents but I flatted down the first main descent and couldn't catch back up to her. So Craig and I rode together and had fun. And then we CRUSHED the buffet post stage. We slept in a tent that the event organizer gave us (also named Tom Skinner) and then followed the race up to Whister the next morning. Instead of riding the stage, Craig and I rode 'Comfortably Numb' which is a pretty fun epic trail. After that I took down a DQ Blizzard and then it was off to Salmon Arm.
Staying in Salmon Arm for a couple nights was pretty good. I did some fun riding up in the South Canoe trails, but when I climbed to the very top I found that a massive section of forest had been logged and one sweet trail was gone. I cried a little.
Now I've been in Canmore for two days after seeing two bears on the drive up; one black bear and one grizzly. Yesterday I camped just North of town, did a few loops of the Nationals course, and went for a swim in Quarry Lake. From now on it's just the bad part of bike racing; being a selfish lazy turd and lying around with my feet up, trying to save my heartbeats.
I was planning on showing Tanya some good lines down the descents but I flatted down the first main descent and couldn't catch back up to her. So Craig and I rode together and had fun. And then we CRUSHED the buffet post stage. We slept in a tent that the event organizer gave us (also named Tom Skinner) and then followed the race up to Whister the next morning. Instead of riding the stage, Craig and I rode 'Comfortably Numb' which is a pretty fun epic trail. After that I took down a DQ Blizzard and then it was off to Salmon Arm.
Staying in Salmon Arm for a couple nights was pretty good. I did some fun riding up in the South Canoe trails, but when I climbed to the very top I found that a massive section of forest had been logged and one sweet trail was gone. I cried a little.
Now I've been in Canmore for two days after seeing two bears on the drive up; one black bear and one grizzly. Yesterday I camped just North of town, did a few loops of the Nationals course, and went for a swim in Quarry Lake. From now on it's just the bad part of bike racing; being a selfish lazy turd and lying around with my feet up, trying to save my heartbeats.
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| Warming up with Tanya and Russ |
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| Climbing to the first aid station |
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| Climbing the sweet S-track |
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| Not the good kind of cougars |
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| New 2012 Rocky 29'er - Unveiled post-stage |
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| Tent city |
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Tofino Adventure
Drove up to Tofino on Thursday and hiked Lone Cone Mountain. It's a 15 min boat ride from Tofino Harbour over to Meares Island where the hike starts. After that it's a 30 min slightly soggy approach to the base, then just over an hour to the top. The trail is much narrower than Mt Finlayson or the Grouse Grind. And it's harder to navigate. It's not as well marked and there are multiple lines all over the place. Definitely a solid adventure.
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