Farther, Longer

Well, this is it. The final push to what should be the longest event of my sorted cycling career...the Logan to Jackson road race (LOTOJA). The season leading up to this point has gone as well as I could have hoped and is documented in these pages. I've had the privilege of winning a few races and been close a few more times. My top-end speed is good and my endurance at the end of the typical road race is adequate. But the upcoming event on September 12th is anything but typical. It is the longest, one-day, USAC sanctioned event in the country. The 209 mile distance provides a unique set of challenges that are encountered in few other races during the year. Training, mental preparation and nutrition all must be attended to in ways not needed for other events.

An experienced LOTOJA racer once told me that he was not going to do the event this year because it required such a different training approach and he was focusing more on traditional events. He felt that the miles required to do well at the race hindered his preparation for regular races. With that take in mind, I approached this season with a compromise. I would up the miles during my regular training days, being over-prepared from an endurance standpoint considering the relatively short distances of masters' road races and typical criteriums. I would log the required intensity efforts for these shorter events. Then, when the typical void in the schedule popped up in August, I would switch to bigger miles, more climbing and experiment with feeding strategies specific to a 10 hour effort. 

LOTOJA is now less than 3 weeks away and things are feeling good. In spite of what the Kool-Aide slingers at Crossfit Endurance would tell me, I have logged some serious miles these past few weeks and my performance has been encouraging. I started this block immediately following the Alan Butler Criterium and Jackson Hole Criterium weekend. My wife and I drove out of town that Sunday evening heading to Cody, Wyoming. We camped just outside of the East Entrance to Yellowstone and finished the drive Monday morning. We left the car at the Holiday Inn and rode our bikes to Red Lodge, Montana. This is one of the area's classic beat down rides involving two major mountain passes, Dead Indian and Bear Tooth and over 180 km of riding.

Leaving Cody was not pretty. There was a serious head wind and an insipient grade for the first 15 miles or so that hurt my psyche early. It's a big open 4-lane highway that is kind of dirty. Not long after that, however, we turned onto the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway and the real fun began. The road surface is great and the traffic mellow. The climb over Dead Indian Pass is awesome with a pretty chill grade with long switch backs. After an enjoyable descent down the other side there is a 40-50 km slog up the Sunlight Basin, a beautiful road if it weren't for the block headwind we were plowing into. There is a store at the half way point but otherwise the area feels remote.

After that stretch, we took a right onto the Bear Tooth Highway and up we went for about 50 km. The terrain is sick, with nice grades and little traffic besides Harleys. There is a store at about 10,000 ft called the Top of the World for viddles if you need them. The name is a bit of a head fake, however, as there is quite a bit more climbing to be done to the East and West summits. Once there, the plunge down into the Red Lodge side of the pass is stunning. After about 20 km of descending we hit the bottom of the valley but it was still fast and mostly downhill all the way into town.  Killer!

We shipped a small care package of clothes to a bed and breakfast in Red Lodge and spent Tuesday eating and checking out the town. Not much to do but the food choices are good and I needed the rest. The following morning, we retraced our tracks, this time with a tail wind from town to the base of the climb and basically no wind up the climb. The basin was more enjoyable in this direction as it tended downhill but upwind. Dead Indian was just a bitchin' this way and we had a screaming tail wind into Cody.  Monday was 8.5 hours and Wednesday was 7.5 hours. If you told me last year that I would be doing training rides like that comfortably I would have laughed and said, "NOT!"

I took Thursday off due to work stuff, rode 50 km on Friday and 100 km on Saturday. Sunday was an annual LOTOJA training ride organized by some friends out of Ashton, Idaho. We first did 60 km through the farmland, hitting a town limit sprint along the way. We regrouped back at the car and headed off into the meat of the day, a 140 km romp up a remote road to nowhere called Fish Creek. This thing climbs all the way and there were 4 organized KOM sprints along the way to keep it hard. After the turn around and a water break, we dropped back down toward Ashton but not before hitting a short climb back up onto the plateau, through some rollers and to the final sprint that marked the finish. Rob Van Kirk and I managed to get away on the little climb and we hammered the rollers staying away with me winning the final dash to the line.

So, after over 700 km of riding for the week, I was able to keep full pressure on the pedals and sprint hard for the finish at the end of the week. I definitely had the sense that my training was proceeding in the right direction.

With only a day's rest I showed up to the Tuesday group ride unsure of how my legs would feel and a desire to hold back on the throttle a bit. Well, we had the biggest turnout of the year and the boyz were antsy. Needless to say, I could not help myself. I rode hard as usual and although I felt slightly blocked, I opened up near the end and was able to throw bombs like usual. In spite of that, I felt as if I was dancing on dangerous territory and could easily go over the edge if I pushed it further. I decided to back off for a few days and let the dust settle.

Full recovery has come easily. None of these rides have seemed to knock me down for days but rather leave my legs fatigued for only 24 hours. These mini cycles of overreaching and rest seem to be doing the trick. My latest venture saw me doing 220 km over the course of 8:15. Once again, I felt great towards the end, pushing the last few rollers back into town and sprinting for stop lights before home just to see what the legs felt like. As the Euros like to say, I have good sensations!

I'm not sure if there is much more to do than to keep the long rides coming until a week to go. I'm doing a bit more climbing these days, going over Teton Pass instead of heading into the Park where the riding is mostly flat. I continue to eat fat, mostly almonds, during rides as well as my bar of choice for LOTOJA, Peason's Salted Nut Roll. Being more efficient at burning fat will hold off the eventual exhaustion of my limited carbohydrate stores. I'm saving the gels for the end. My weight is the lowest it's been in 12 years. I'm eating well and sleeping enough. All that is left is to taper the week before and push off from the line. I get butterflies just thinking about it! Stay tuned. - Brian