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Welcome to Team Bikeman: For nearly two decades Team Bikeman.com has been a mainstay in bike racing. Beginners all the way up to pros proudly compete in the red, white and black of Team Bikeman.com. Our resume is extensive with state, regional, national and master's worlds champions in our ranks. We are truly a national grassroots racing team with membership from coast to coast. We compete in mountain, road, cyclocross, time trial, triathlon and pretty much anything else you can do on two wheels. We don't discriminate, if you do it on a bicycle and someone is timing it, we will race it. If you feel you would be a good fit for Team Bikeman.com contact our Team Manager.
Team Bikeman Sections: Race Report Archives | Team Rider Profiles |
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12 Days with JB |
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Team Bikeman -
Race Reports
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Written by John Burns
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Wednesday, 21 June 2006 |
Sugar Mountain NORBA NCS #2 to Mount Snow NORBA NCS #3
 I want to apologize in advance if this is a little long. This is recovery week for me and I have a little extra time on my hands. Over the last two weeks I have been all over the east coast. I started heading down to North Carolina on Wednesday June 7th. Oh yeah, it’s raining, hard, so hard that my morning rowing session was cancelled. In addition to my fun on the bike, Monday and Wednesday mornings I row in a quad scull down in the harbor.
. I wasn’t too disappointed because I knew I had a long drive ahead and now I could get a little extra rest. I stopped in Connecticut to pick up my friend and fellow Semi-Pro rider Brian Firliet from the Coyote Hill team. Brian and I are both coached by Beau Lambert at the “Athlete Development Group.” Driving was not fun. With all the rain, accidents (a couple small ones and a flipped Pathfinder), and low visibility, we did not spend much time above 50 mph until we got through a good chunk of PA. This put us a bit behind schedule and we stopped for the night around 10:30 at the 66/81 interstate crossing in Virginia. We put in about 15 minutes spinning around the hotel parking lot and side streets to loosen the legs from the drive.
We got down to the race about 2:30pm on Thursday and got everything from registration. Just as we are about to set out on our pre ride we got hit with some more rain and wound up waiting it out for about ten minutes inside the lodge with a couple other guys. Once the rain let up we started riding. The course basically climbs up to the top of Sugar Mountain and shoots right back down. As Brian and I are riding up we were saying “this sucks.” The climb is all fire road and pavement. Yes pavement. I thought we were doing a mountain bike race. The descent had 5 minutes of super sloppy and technical singletrack with some fresh cut. The rest is wide open grass/ dirt ski slope back to the finish line. The course left a ton of room for improvement. After talking with a local there fortunately looks to be good potential for that. After the pre ride, we met up with Bikeman.com and “Athlete Development Group” teammate Andrew Freye, whom we were staying with. We cooked dinner, hung out, and relaxed.
 Race day brought out the sun and warm temperatures. Not enough to dry out the short muddy sections of singetrack, but it was still better than the day before. They did call ups for every one at the start. This put me about 3rd from the end. Off the gun and up the climb I went through about half the field and was feeling ok. I wound up running a couple of sections of the downhill. It did not really cost me much time as most people were struggling anyway. I was riding allright until the 4th lap when I pretty much thought I was going to puke the entire time. I finished 29th. My stomach was still feeling unsettled during my cool down. I was even looking for an exit to the nearest woods while talking to a few people after the race. I grabbed a Coke and the syrup did the trick. Brian, Andrew, and I then spent Friday night watching “Dodge Ball” and “Old School.”
Saturday we made the drive back to MA with 54 “System of a Down” songs in a row through northern VA as the soundtrack highlight. The plan was to get home around 8pm to host people from the team coming down to the NEMBA Festival, in my backyard of Wompatuck State Park, to support our sponsors Bikeman.com/ Carver bikes and Salsa Cycles. After a few phone calls in route Saturday morning, I was told the Festival had been cancelled because there was over 8 inches of standing water at the park.
Since no one was coming down to stay with me, we made a couple of stops. First stop was in Easton, PA to see my old friend Rob, his wife Jen, and their baby girl Ava. Rob and I grew up together in NJ and it has been awhile since we had hung out. Next, Brian and I decided we needed a singletrack fix and hit my old stomping grounds of Lewis Morris Park in Morristown, NJ. We hit the trails for about an hour and a half or so and then grabbed burgers at the Morristown Diner. I dropped Brian off in CT and finished the drive to MA.
Sunday morning around 8am I met up with Zach Magoon from the team. He and I ruled Wompatuck State Park back in the day when he was also a Hingham, MA resident. We decided that we would head over and check out the trails to see how wet they really were. The conditions were pretty bad. It was definitely a good thing that the festival was cancelled. All the extra traffic would have done some damage. We did hit a couple of short sections that neither of us had been on. Fast forward to the end of the ride when I proceeded to break my freehub body on my WTB Laser Disc Lite and limped home. I have now broken every freehub I have ever had, although this one lasted the longest. This was a big downer since I was leaving for Mt. Snow Thursday morning and was not sure how I was going to get the part in time. I was a little stressed out.
So Monday morning after the rowing workout, I sent Al, the team manager at Bikeman.com, an email asking if he had a new freehub body in stock up at the shop. He did not, but vowed he would have an answer for me by the end of the day. Al came through big. He got on the horn to WTB and by the end of the day I had a new freehub body kit traveling 2nd Day Air.
Wednesday morning I am back on the water rowing, hoping everything is cool with the freehub and that it will be waiting for me when I get home from work. All is instantly fine when I pull up to the front door and there is a nice package resting on the steps. I decided to bag my ride for Wednesday night and spend the time putting the new freehub on and getting my bike dialed for Mt. Snow. When I got everything apart I saw that the old engagement plate was almost completely smooth. The WTB freehub body mechanism is wicked trick, the guy that designed it deserves every penny they paid him. Everything went back together smooth. I slept pretty well knowing my bike was perfect again.
I love Mt. Snow and I was really looking forward to getting back there. My coach had rented a huge house just off the mountain and I would be living, riding, and racing with most of the riders from the “Athlete Development Group” that he runs. The group turned out to be huge. Here is the breakdown, Beau, my coach, his wife and 3 kids, Kirk, Brad, Brian, Andrew (Bikeman.com), Brian P., and Jerome from the Athlete Development Group, Trish from Scott, Doug from Vicious Cycles, and Brian from the Krum team. So after a few errands Thursday morning, I pointed the car north to VT and Mt. Snow.
I got up to the mountain in the late afternoon, met up with Brian Firliet, and put in 2 laps on the race course. For those who don’t know, Mt. Snow is one of the best courses ever put together. There is lots of climbing, some of it fireroad and some of it technical, broken up by sweet downhills. It’s capped off with a long, rocky, root infested, steep descent that’s known for being gnarly, but is really just plain fun. The conditions this year were the best I have ever seen. The course had only a few muddy and slick sections, enough that you would be brown after a lap, but really a non-issue. After our pre ride, we headed over to the house, got cleaned up, and sat down for dinner. We spent the rest of the night watching “Animal House”.
Since the Semi-Pro race was not until 2pm, I spent the morning getting my bike shined up and relaxing on the couch. Around 1pm I met up with Bikeman.com teammate Mary, who was working the feed zone for me, and gave her my bottles and gel. I got in about a 30 minute warm up, put on some last minute sunscreen and lined up at the start with the rest of the field.
 Once again, I started in the back row. By the top climb I was sitting about mid pack. I was having some stomach issues like the week before in NC. I tasted a little bit of peanut butter coming up from my sandwich at lunch, but it wasn’t so bad and picked off a few people mid race. I hit the last lap downhill with Brian only a few seconds behind. I knew he was faster than me on the descent, so I really let it run. I figured as long as I could keep reasonably close, I could catch him on the fire road into the finish where I knew I was fast. He wound up passing me about half way down. I brought back some of the time on the short climb between downhill sections. When we popped out on the fire road under the bridge I could just make him out ahead. I hit the gas pretty hard and passed him about a hundred yards from the finish to take 21st. Overall the race went well. I was not too far back from 15th. My time would have put me ahead of a few racing Pro, and that’s good. It could have been a bit better without the stomach problems. Hopefully I can get it straighten it out and really put the hurt on.
I put in a short cool down and headed back to the house. I got my bike cleaned up and sat down for dinner. Adding to the zoo were dinner guests Adam and Carl from Giant. After dinner we settled in for the nights feature presentation, the violent and bloody “The Boondocks Saints”, definitely a JB kind of movie. I highly recommend it.
I took it easy Saturday. I spent the morning resting on the couch. After lunch I headed out for and easy ride with Jerome and then ditched my bike in the pit for Andrew in case he needed a part during the Pro race. I watched the Pro race with Bikeman teammates Matt DeMeis and LT Steve for awhile and then headed over to watch the descent. Saturday night dinner guest was Max Plaxton from the Rocky Mountain team. After some ice cream and a little of the Stanley Cup, I was feeling tired and called it an early night to be fresh for the short track on Sunday.
Sunday morning brought the heat. It was around 90 degrees by noon and getting hotter. The expert racers actually lucked out with the 8am start, and beat at least some of the heat. Due to the heat, I stayed inside the house until around noon and then headed over to the short track.
The short track did not go well. I was feeling ok with the low 90’s heat, but then completely missed my left pedal off the gun. Being that it is a 20 minute race, I decided I better just go. I was dead last and fighting not to get dropped while I was trying to get clipped in. I finally got my act together going into the climb and let it rip. I got past some people, but the leaders were pretty far ahead. I gave it a solid effort, but couldn’t make up enough ground. I got pulled. I was pissed off at myself for a while and then seemed to calm down after a cool down spin. I really don’t know what happened with not getting my shoe into the pedal.
So there it is, twelve days with JB. Hopefully you didn’t fall asleep at the keyboard reading it. I am usually pretty quiet and to the point. I am finally feeling comfortable racing Semi-Pro and there is still plenty of MTB racing left. Special thanks to Brian’s friend from UConn who worked the feed zone for us at Sugar Mountain, the Bikeman.com ladies, Mary, Olivia, Linda, and others working the feed zone and cheering for me at Mt. Snow, Beau for feeding and taking care of everyone at Mt. Snow, and Al at Bikeman.com and WTB for working hard and getting me a new freehub body kit in time to make the race, I appreciate it. Next up is the AMBC race Sunday down at one of my old NJ haunts, Kittatinny Valley State Park. Goodbye until next week.
JB
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