Bike stoke returns

Ripping down the Braille Trail. Photo by Leah. 

When I went to prep my Moots for a short ride on Tuesday, I discovered both tubeless tires were nearly flat. "That's strange," I thought, until I considered it some more. After finishing the Stagecoach 400 on April 30, I had that period of post-race malaise that I described as recovery fatigue, but was really more like mild shell-shock. Then there was the week of road biking with Keith, the motorcycle collision that further sliced into my bike passion, and a much-needed retreat into running. As it stood on May 29, I had ridden my beloved Moots nearly 1,000 miles in the month of April — and zero in May.

Leah set out to help me change that sad statistic by suggesting a Wednesday ride at Soquel Demonstration Forest, an out-of-the-way but nonetheless popular mountain biking spot for its "deliciously technical singletrack" and "black-diamond" trails adorned with teeter-totters, log bridges, and jumps that will launch the braver freeriders into outer space. Honestly, if I had done any research on the area before we headed out there, I probably would have tried to talk Leah into riding somewhere else. But she had ridden there before about three years ago, and assured me from what she remembered, it was fun.

The day was warm and sunny, and both of us were coated in globes of sweat as we climbed an exposed fire road toward Santa Rosalia Mountain. I felt apprehensive about the technical portions ahead, until we launched into the singletrack. Tunnel vision closed around my dread, and I felt renewed excitement emerge from the ashes of burnout. A pleasant breeze wicked the sweat from my skin as all focus narrowed to the trail — a ribbon of hard-packed dirt threaded through a thick canopy of young redwoods. The singletrack was steep but flowing; turns clicked naturally into place, and the A Line features were entirely avoidable. We had so much fun that we opted to climb 1,500 more feet just to ride another piece of tasty singletrack, the Braille Trail, which was even steeper and yet more fun. By the end of our three-and-a-half-hour ride I was buzzing with bike stoke, and I can't wait for the next time I can get my Moots back on some dirt.

Of course, I have some running to do first. Beat and I signed up for the Mount Diablo race this weekend. He's running the 60K and I opted for "only" the trail marathon, which has "only" 8,000 feet of climbing. I plan to "run" this one exceptionally slowly and use it mainly as heat acclimation and a final shake-out for the Laurel Highlands Ultra, which is the following weekend. Ask me what I'm expecting out of that race and I'll admit that I try not to think about it too much. I'll leave it at that until I have no choice but to panic, which will probably come around 3 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (midnight Pacific Time) next Friday. After that I'll probably be seriously burned out on running, after which I can return to regularly scheduled summer plans of hiking and bikepacking. Ha!

On the way home from Demo Forest, Leah's car started making a loud humming noise, and we confirmed the front tire was flat. It had been more than ten years since either of us had changed a wheel on a car, and our efforts to work through all the steps based on vague memories — unloading the entire trunk rack and trunk for tools, jumping up and down on the tire wrench, wrestling with the jack crank — were rather humorous. And took a ridiculously long time. We had the car jacked up and all the bolts removed — so we nearly had it — when a man drove by and asked us if we needed help. Our response was likely less than confidence inspiring, so after he drove away he returned five minutes later to help us finish the task because "you don't want to be out here after dark." As we drove home, we debated the "damsel in distress" phenomenon — whether he would have stopped if we were two men instead of two women, whether we were annoyed that our self-sufficient efforts were thwarted so we can't bask in that satisfaction that we fixed our own flat (and yes, I realize how elementary school easy it is), or whether we were glad the man was nice enough to stop and help two strangers stalled on the side of the road. I tend to agree with the latter conclusion. It's nice that there are still helpful people in the world.

See, California isn't so bad

Back when I lived in Juneau, I tried to coax my friends into visiting me by promising that I could prove why Juneau really "isn't so bad." "Don't worry about the possibility of mind-numbing rain; we can still go ride bikes on the beach and that's actually a lot of fun." Strangely, I never had any Outside visitors besides my parents in the five years I lived in Southeast Alaska. Since I moved to the Bay area, I've had several out-of-state friends express interest in visiting. I guess California is just a more visitor friendly location, and it's fun to have a chance to show off my new backyard, which I also believe "isn't so bad." This past weekend, my friend Danni from Kalispell, Montana, flew down for a Memorial Day vacation.

Another incentive I usually add when trying to coax friends to visit me is the promise that "we don't have to torture ourselves" — since apparently most of my friends assume my notion of "fun" is synonymous with grueling all-day slog fests. I try to reiterate that I do the slog fests on my own time, and prefer to have actual fun when other people are involved. I'm not sure Danni was banking on a 52-mile weekend when she flew out here, and honestly I wasn't either. But Danni and I are both too alike in many ways, and the miles stacked up all the same. On Friday we did ten miles on my current favorite running trail, preferred for its UTMB training-appropriate properties of being both steep and downhill runnable. After we descended out of the fog on top of Black Mountain, I pointed out all the local landmarks — "That cluster of buildings is downtown San Jose. There's the NASA complex. Google is just to the left along the shoreline." I also added fascinating bits of trivia that I learned from reading trail maps — "Mountain View is named after this mountain, because the town's settlers could, you know, see it from their settlement."

On Saturday we decided to fight the holiday crowds through Marin County to visit Point Reyes National Seashore. We picked up my friend Leah, who has about the same opinion of running that Danni seems to have about cycling — "It should be fun, in theory, but it's kinda not." Plus Leah was recovering from a cold, so I promised "hiking, only hiking." See? I can be a great activity negotiator.  We still ended up on a 14-mile walk, moving at a brisk clip. Walking long distances quickly is often more tiring than running long distances slowly, even at comparable speeds. But it did give us plenty of time to discuss possibilities for future bike adventures.

The scenery in Point Reyes was stunning, with a brisk sea breeze skimming the grassy hillsides.


Beat ran a few extra miles during the hike, and I joined him for a spur down to the shoreline. We found a hidden cove that seemed like an idyllic spot to run along the beach and maybe set up camp for a long stay. I mused on this fantasy until Beat pointed out that the high tide line ended right at the bluffs, which were too steep and loose to climb in most spots that we could see. Just like most great places in nature, Point Reyes is peaceful and enticing right up to the point that it threatens to kill you.

On Sunday morning we set out to run the Skyline to the Sea Trail, a popular backpacking route that descends from the Santa Cruz Mountains to the Pacific Coast through the thick forests of Big Basin Redwoods State Park. We set up a shuttle with our friends so we could complete it as a point-to-point run, 28 miles total.

We got a fairly early start in order to coordinate scheduling with our friends, and it was 45 degrees and foggy at the top of Skyline. The fog was thick enough that it "rained" on us for the first five miles, but it made for a wonderfully spooky run through the woods. Every Halloween, Danni and her husband Ted throw costume parties, and Danni dresses as some version of an Ewok. Beat and I attended the "sexy Ewok" party in 2010, so the mossy forest setting invariably prompted many Ewok jokes.

We all became increasingly more giddy as we loped through the Sexy Ewok Forest. "Oh, the wonders of combining endorphins and beautiful nature," Beat said. "And sugar," I added as I munched on a piece of Danni's Pop Tart. "Don't forget sugar."

Danni posed with some of the larger redwoods we passed, many with trunks hollowed out by wildfire.

We met up with Steve and Harry near Big Basin Headquarters and continued along a high ridge toward the coast. The pace picked up after we connected with the boys, and Danni and I had a tougher time keeping up. About two miles from our lunch stop, Danni mentioned she was having difficulty breathing. Seconds later she emitted several loud gasping noises and then went silent. I could tell she was trying to speak, but couldn't. I thought she was having an asthma attack and panicked a little, and tried to suggest that we turn around immediately and return to Big Basin to call for help. After she caught her breath again, she insisted it wasn't an asthma attack. We couldn't figure out what caused her airway to constrict so badly for several long seconds. She was fine for the rest of the run, but it was still scary. I thought another friend's visit was going to end at the hospital.

But we did make it all the way from Skyline to the Sea, wrapping up a mostly relaxing run. We spent Monday in San Francisco, moving only enough to make our way from a little bistro where we ate lunch, to a shoreline bar for midday appetizers, followed by a short jaunt through Golden Gate Park. I also had a chance to meet up with my aunt for dinner at a tasty Italian restaurant in North Beach. It was a fun day of marathon eating to make up for our weekend of marathon trail running/hiking.

It's hard to believe that it was just two years ago when I showed up on Danni's doorstep with the introduction, "Hey, I'm Keith's friend Jill," and the plan to hike more than 35 miles through Glacier National Park with a woman I'd never met. Two years later and a thousand miles apart, we're still sharing long marches and the occasional uncontrolled giggle outburst. Thanks for visiting me in Cali, Danni. 

The road ahead

On Monday, I saw my doctor for an annual physical. I was convinced my blood tests were going to show something — low blood glucose levels, iron deficiency, something. Nope. Normal. The doctor asked questions about sleep, weight loss, and stress, which have also worked their way back to normal. Then my doctor had the nerve to suggest that the symptoms I described — general sluggishness, sudden bouts of fatigue in the middle of the day, and lower energy levels — probably had something to do with "the endurance exercise."

Bah.

But as much as I can understand what's going on with my own body, I really do feel like I'm starting to emerge after several weeks under water, and the Ohlone 50K was my first hit of fresh air in what feels like a while. I suspect that my "fun" spring of biking was a lot more difficult for me than I was willing to admit, and the "short" bikepacking race — the Stagecoach 400 — required me to dig a lot deeper into my reserves, and therefore required more recovery, than I wanted to believe. For example, on day two of the Stagecoach 400, I woke up at 5:30 a.m. in Fish Creek Wash and spent the next fifteen hours making my way to Alpine, which was 70 miles away. I had one hour-long breakfast break in there, but for the remaining fourteen hours I was struggling at the crumbling edge of a sustainable pace, in temperatures that topped 90 degrees, for an average moving speed that essentially matched my Ohlone 50K pace. That was just one day of the 400-mile race, and not even a full day, because I continued beyond Alpine for three more hours in the late evening.

The Ohlone 50K, by comparison, was a lot smoother. I'm actually thrilled about how well that race went for me. After feeling like lukewarm road kill for most of the morning, I crossed the threshold of more reasonable daytime hours (for me, the hours after 9 a.m.) and didn't experience much of a struggle for the rest of the day. I was near the end of the line during the climb to Mission Peak, and slowly moved up in the pack during the race. I ended up finishing 71st of 230 starters, and 14th of 67 women ... which, I think it's fair to say, is solidly top third. And although my failure to train for running meant I wouldn't have been able to run it much faster, I do feel I could have run a fair amount farther. If someone told me I could win $1,000 if I turned around and ran the whole course backward for a full 100K, I might have been willing to give it a try. Yeah, I know, it's easy to say that now. But I felt good at the finish of the Ohlone 50K, and recovery runs since haven't even shown the same levels of sluggishness that I was feeling before the Stagecoach 400.

I'm still slow. BUT, I feel like my long-distance endurance is actually pretty good right now. Which, give my aspirations for a potential 46-hour death march at UTMB in three months, is a good place to be.

Good rest and regular fun bike rides are still a priority for me right now, in hope that I do finally dig myself out of my springtime slump. But I at least feel slightly less gloom and doom for the next "benchmark" event I've gotten myself entangled in, the Laurel Highlands Ultra. Beat signed up for this 70.5-mile trail race in southwestern Pennsylvania because his friend Tim Hewitt — the godfather of human-powered Iditarod Trail travel — told him it would be "fun." I admit I have a different opinion about the potential agony of 70 miles of rocky, rooty, steep East Coast trails, but I agreed to sign up as well because I need mental (not to mention foot) conditioning for UTMB. Given the technical aspect of the Laurel Highlands Trail and the race's fairly tight time cut-off that will require me to move faster than my "all day all night" jogging/hiking pace, I still have heavy doubts that I can finish that race. But at least I'm slightly less convinced of my imminent demise on June 9. 

Goodbye to a good bike

Attempting to powder-shred with Pugsley in Spaulding Meadows, Juneau, Alaska.

 I sold my Pugsley.

I know, I thought I'd never write those words. If there was any bike I just assumed I'd keep forever, for sentimental reasons if nothing else, it was Pugsley. I loved this bike. But I didn't love seeing Pugsley hanging on my wall, gathering dust, and never being ridden. I quietly put Puglsey up for sale, and a couple of weeks ago, I mailed him off to his new home in Palmer, Alaska. I like to imagine a bright future of trips to Knik Glacier, beach riding along the Matanuska River, and perhaps even more miles on the Iditarod Trail. A bike like Pugsley deserves to be ridden in Alaska — not languish on a wall in California. Plus, Pugsley *is* just a bike. But I do sort of miss him.

This 16" battleship gray Surly Pugsley came into my life in September 2007. Buying this bike was my method of coaxing myself into signing up for the Iditarod Invitational. I figured if I had the right bike, I could somehow be ready for that kind of expedition (ha!) For the two years prior I was an avid winter cyclist, making do with a full-suspension Gary Fisher Sugar and a hybrid 40mm-rim "Snaux Bike." Anyone who claims that fat bikes aren't superior for their intended purpose as a go-anywhere, all-terrain bike have, in my opinion, simply never actually ridden one in appropriate fat bike conditions — deep but packed snow, soft mud, or sand. Pugsley was a revelation for me; suddenly I had so much more mobility than I ever imagined.

This is a photo from one of my first rides with Pugsley, taken on the Salmon Creek Trail, which was part of my "long" commute to work at the Juneau Empire. Pugsley and I spent a lot of quality time together that first winter, training for the ITI. I expressed my love for my bike in blog posts like "Ode to Pugsley."

Here we are on Sevenmile Lake on the first day of the 2008 ITI. When you go through an experience like that with a bike, it cements a strong love-hate relationship. There were times when I couldn't find the strength to push that heavy bike up a frozen headwall, and I nearly just left it there. Then, minutes later, I'd be coasting down a hard-packed slope, buzzing with elation.


Pugsley wasn't just a winter bike. I made it an ongoing summer project to circumnavigate Douglas Island along the cliff-lined beach. It was always an adventure — crushing mussel shells, steamrolling barnacle-crusted rocks, grinding over sand, racing high tides, mowing down beach grass, and eventually meeting an unworkable obstacle, like cliffs that dropped straight into the sea. Douglas Island is doable with a packraft, but I do believe it would be easier and probably faster overall on foot. Still, trying to use fat bikes for off-trail explorations is a lot of fun.

Beat and I posing with Pugsley in Missoula, on what I believe was Beat's first snow ride. Shortly after this, Beat purchased his aluminum Fatback, and it wasn't long before I started cheating on Pugsley with Beat's bike. I prefer the Fatback for many reasons — it's lighter, more agile, and seems to fit me better (even though it's Beat's bike.) We discussed it and decided that the chance the two of us will ride snow bikes together, ever, is fairly low at this point. It no longer made sense to keep the Pugsley. So I sent him back to Alaska, where I think he'll be happy in the way bikes can be happy — that is, I'm happy because someone else out there is falling in love with a fat bike. 

Busting out at the Ohlone 50K

Photo by Joseph Swenson

If my confidence wasn't already tenuous enough, my body had to go and zonk out on the shuttle bus. Under normal circumstances, I'm a picky sleeper. I need horizontal silence, and no matter how much I want to, I can rarely take naps in vehicles or on planes unless I am: a) drugged; b) on at least hour 36 of sleep deprivation; or c) so physically spent that I lose consciousness involuntarily. After sucking down a large cup of coffee on the way to Lake Del Valle — the finishing point of the Ohlone 50K — I sat next to Beat on a tiny hard-backed seat of a school bus for an hour-long shuttle to the race start. After what seemed like three minutes, we were there and my neck was really sore. But rather than improve my energy levels, the nap left my head feeling like it was sinking into the deep end of a flu-addled haze. I never feel stellar before 9 a.m., but on this morning I was fully distraught about my physical state. Hazy head, lead legs, sour stomach, the knowledge that I had run only a few more miles in the past month than I expected to run on this single day, a forecast calling for temperatures in the high 80s to low 90s, and now this — apparently uncontrollable sleepiness.

Beat left to wait in the Disneyland-worthy line for the toilets and I plopped down on the grass, resting my chin on my knees like a pouty child and stewing on how much I really wanted to DNS the Ohlone 50K. Of course I could not, for multiple reasons, but the main one is the reality that if I'm not ready to run a hilly 50K now, in late May, then I surely won't be ready for UTMB by late August. The hundreds of hard miles I've biked in the past two months have left at least my head if not my body feeling overworked. But for all of that pedaling, I've only run a few dozen miles in that same time period, largely as slow recovery jogs. So I was overtired and undertrained. Perfect. But my big goal for the summer is a near-impossible foot race, so I needed some kind of physical and mental benchmark. I stood up to slather on necessary sunscreen, and my knees nearly buckled under the strain. I expected the Ohlone 50K to dole out some hard lessons.
 

The Ohlone 50K, now in its 25th year, is a storied event in the annals of Northern California trail running. It attracts a sold-out field of 200-plus runners and is widely regarded as one of the toughest trail races in the region. The point-to-point course traverses the Sunol Wilderness, summiting two prominent peaks and more than 8,000 feet of relentlessly steep climbing in the process. But the elevation gain alone isn't what makes the race tough, it's the sun exposure. Shade is scarce, steep canyons block any hint of breeze, and temperatures often stretch into the 90s during the five-plus hours that most everyone is on the course. (Even fast runners are told to take their best 50K times and add at least an hour for the Ohlone 50K.) But the region has a soft kind of beauty — rounded topography, clusters of broad trees, and golden hillsides that shimmer in the sunlight.

The course gains 2,500 feet right out of the gate, on the four-mile climb to the top of Mission Peak. I started out with fellow back-of-packers who were "taking it easy" in order to save themselves for the really brutal stuff later in the day. The difference between me and them was I kinda was giving that climb everything I had to give — which was a slow plod. My stomach gurgled and I regretted not waiting in the bathroom line, not that it would have paid off anyway. It took me an hour and fifteen minutes to reach the top, which I figured was slower than my casual hiking pace, but still better than full-on death march pace. Late-morning sunlight sparkled on the suburban grid of the valley, now far enough below to register as geometric patterns. Despite the rapid rise in temperatures, I was finally starting to perk up.

"Maybe I'm finally starting to warm up," I thought. I've noticed in the past that when my body is accustomed to go-all-day endurance, it can take an hour or more before I even get up to speed, like starting a diesel truck on a cold day. Still, I ran down Mission Peak at a mellow clip, figuring I didn't want to press too hard on the gas and risk flooding the engine. At the first aid station I discovered this race supplied jelly beans, which was a good omen. I had already decided pre-race that I was only going to consume simple sugars in order to keep heat-related stomach unhappiness at bay, and I always worry that I might have to subsist on gels. I refilled my water — a 70-ounce bladder already largely depleted after only six miles — and stuffed a handful of jelly beans in my mouth. The problem with Jelly Belly is there are just enough revolting flavors to ruin any handful. Every time I jogged away from an aid station I always had a hit of "Ew, peanut butter." "Gross, coffee and fruity don't mix." "Arrrgh, buttered popcorn!" Still, it beats gels. 

By the time I reached the bottom of Sunol canyon, mile ten, the heat was beginning to take its toll. Fellow racers were sitting in the shade or having volunteers pour water over their heads. I didn't feel overheated yet, but when I pulled out my bladder it was again only a quarter full, meaning I had sucked down another quart and a half of water in just four mostly downhill miles. I took a couple of salt tabs, ate some more jelly beans ("Ugh, coconut") and started up the next steep ascent. 

As I climbed, one of the first thoughts that occurred to me was, "This isn't nearly as tough as pushing my bike up Oriflamme Canyon." When the trail leveled out and cut across sideslopes on its rolling traverse, I thought, "This is way less work than hike-a-biking down Noble Canyon." The Stagecoach 400 comparisons, and the fact that I was passing quite a few people, boosted my mood and I responded by running harder when I could run, and marching forcefully on the grades that my calf muscles refused to lift from. Because it was so hot, and because the scenery was similar, I spent a lot of time reminiscing about the Stagecoach 400. Apparently, in my memory, I hike-a-biked the whole thing, because I was thrilled that I only had 31 miles to cover in the Ohlone 50K. "I only have to do seven hours of this. Yay, biking is hard, running is ea-seeeee." (Note: I do not actually believe this. But I'll play any mind game with myself in order to get through a tough challenge.) 

Photo by Joseph Swenson

Still, my body wasn't willing to listen to the tricks without protest. My hamstrings ached, a persistent side-stitch stabbed at my kidneys during the descents, and my knees were just sensitive enough to keep me from letting go on the flatter sections even though my energy levels remained high. I continued my Jelly Belly/ salt tabs/ ridiculous amount of water regimen. It was too much water and caused me to feel extremely bloated, and I eventually stopped taking salt because I felt that way, but it did keep the sweat layer flowing nicely. I usually wither in heat and never imagined I could survive, let alone thrive, in a fifty-kilometer run in 90-degree temperatures. I probably have the heat acclimation of the Stagecoach 400 to thank for that as well.

The final ascent to Rocky Ridge nearly did me in, though, as it did to many of the racers. The narrow, windless canyon had trapped a pocket of air that felt hotter than a hundred degrees, and the exposed climb left me feeling dizzy enough that I had to stop and take a few breath-catching breaks. The people around me weren't faring much better, and as soon as I reached the top I really just wanted to take off and get this race over with. My leg muscles and joints were surprisingly not achy, despite my lack of run-specific training in the past few months. For this I really have to credit the Hoka shoes. Those things are awesome, and no, the company doesn't sponsor me. Hoka One Ones are fat bikes for feet — all of the fun, less of the impact.

About a mile from the finish I realized I might actually be able to come in under seven hours — which was way better than my early race estimation of "hoping to break nine." I kicked up the gears and ran the last half mile at 6:20 pace — which for me, because of my neglect of speed work and awkward gait that limits leg turnover, is full-on sprinting. I came in at 6:59:29. I shaved nearly a half hour off my 2011 time, even though the heat was significantly higher this year. I found and surprised Beat, who had finished just a few minutes earlier. "Goes to show that specific training is overrated," he joked.

But I did have a good day at the Ohlone 50K, and I'm grateful for that, because it probably helped my confidence more than any amount of resting could do. Not that I'm going to jump full bore into run training just yet, but at least I have a positive benchmark.

Results from the 2012 Ohlone 50K.