Spring MTB Adventures

I’m finally getting around to recapping my month-long mountain biking adventure in April.  To say it went as planned would be a lie, because there was no plan.  Okay, there was a loose schedule, which involved hitting an ICUP race in St. George, Utah, and making my way to Sea Otter two weeks later, as well as conquering a few of the IMBA “EPICS” rides along the way.  My intentions were to stay on the road as long as money allowed, in the good weather of the Southwest and California, and ride as much as possible.  In hindsight, it turned out to be perfect timing, as the weather in Colorado was abysmal almost the entire month I was gone.

I left Boulder on the morning of April 2^nd, and was in St. George that night.  The weather was forecasted to be in the 80’s and sunny all week.  80-degree weather, the desert, and awesome singletrack, and I was in heaven.  The ICUP Cactus Hugger race was on Saturday, which meant I had 3 days of good riding to do before race day.  I love the riding in St. George, and this time was no different.  It was such a breath of fresh air to get my tires on dirt and be able to rip singletrack again, after a winter of dirt road riding around Boulder.  Every day ended with a shred-session on the Zen trail on the Norco Shinobi trail bike.  Man that trail is soooo much fun.   

Zen Trail - St George, SW Utah from Lee Lau on Vimeo.

By Saturday my legs were pretty smoked from the previous days of riding, but my Vitamin D levels were reaching an all-time high!  For that, I was feeling good.  The Cactus Hugger race course was similar to the Desert Rampage I had done a month earlier; and then it was not.  The second half of the course involved a lot of slickrock and rough climbing, and the downhill section back to the start/finish was a full-on enduro course!  You could’ve brought a 6-inch travel bike and used every bit of it!  Needless to say, it was a rough go on my Cannondale Flash hardtail with a meager 90mm of suspension.  Having a good full-suspension bike was a no-brainer for this course, even for the rough rocky climbs, but as they say, “Run what you brung!”

Top of Zen Trail

I lined up with 15 or so Pros.  At the gun the expected and much demised anaerobic blast took hold, sending heart rates from resting to 200+ bpm in a few seconds!  It’s not something I look forward to.  I must have been in 10^th place or so as we entered the first section of singletrack.  Instead of chasing the leaders I was just trying to find my pace and let my heart settle down before doing any real work.  This seemed to have worked, as I picked off 3-4 riders on that first lap.  The second lap I snatched up 1 or 2 more.  The hardest part of the race was the crushing downhills.  My forearms and hands were on fire from the constant barrage of rocks, drops, slickrock, sand, etc.  It was all I could do to hold onto the Flash and hope it didn’t shatter!  Luckily it made it to the end, and I rolled into the start/finish feeling good.  I didn’t know where I had finished until sometime later when I checked the time sheets and saw my name in 5^th place!  I was stoked on that.  My second Pro race ever (first time finishing one) and I got on the podium!  All in all, and finishing time/place aside, I felt very good about the race.  My body felt amazing through the duration, and was able to push the pace constantly through the 85-degree weather without any issues.  It was also a personal victory that the four riders in front of me were all on full-suspension bikes, and able to pick up huge time on me on the downhill sections. 

St. George was great, but California was in my sights!  I had been dreaming up this trip or something like it for a couple years.  My first stop was in Big Bear, at the suggestion of a fellow racer.  It worked out that Big Bear was on my way into SoCal, and would be a good stopping point for a couple of days.  It did not work out that I would find good riding there.  Some bad bike-shop-employee advice and cold weather meant a short 2-day stay on the mountain.  I came to California to ride in the warm sun, not up in the cold wind of Big Bear. 

Next stop: Santa Barbara.  I would find good riding in Santa Barbara.  One of my first days there I was in search of an IMBA Epic, the Buckhorn loop.  The ride starts with huge 9-mile fireroad climb up the mountains above Santa Barbara.  Then you reach the Buckhorn trail which is supposed to be 17-miles of singletrack.  When I finally got to the trail, it was overgrown and rugged.  Luckily, there was another rider pushing his bike back my way, and said that it was way overgrown and not worth it.  He was headed a little further up the mountain to where we could ride a 6-mile singletrack descent, called Little Pine, back to the parking lot.  I decided to hop on with him and away we were.  It was an amazing ripping descent, traversing super-steep mountainsides almost the entire way.   What an awesome refresher it was after a few days off the bike.  Me and my new friend, Hendrick (on “holiday” from Switzerland), shared the stoke of the trail over a few beers back at our cars.  

Another few days went by, more riding, a failed trail search or two, and the U.S. Cup XC race at Santa Ynez was happening.  This was a race I was slightly nervous about.  Maybe just because of the name, “US CUP”, and also because these CA folk get to ride year-round!  I had no idea what to expect.  The course was set in the rolling golden hills of wine country.  Seriously, the venue, called the Dirt Club, was surrounded by vineyards.  It was a fast course with no real technical challenges whatsoever; besides trying to navigate up and down some newly cut-in singletrack that was really loose.  At this point, after being on the road for two weeks, sleeping in odd places, eating odd food, and riding at odd times with no pre-described training regimen, I was just ready to go out and give it my best, with no expectations.  At the start the field went out fast and I struggled to handle the power they were putting out.  Again, in typical fashion, I found myself mid-pack with a lot of making up to do.  No worries, as there was plenty of time to do so.  Sure enough, on the first big climb I passed 4 or 5 riders.  As the first of two laps progressed I got by another guy, and had another one in my sights as we came up on the start/finish area.  This is where it all went wrong.  That is to say that I went wrong.  I missed the turn back into the start/finish area, as the fire-road I was on led right back into a section of singletrack further down the course.  I had my head down, and amidst all the fury of pushing myself to the limit I blew right through the turn.  It wasn’t until I had ridden another ½-mile or so that I realized what I had done.  By that time it was over.  DNF #2 of the year.  I’ve never been so pissed at myself.  You win some, you lose some, and you fuck some up really bad!!

Moving on.  Next stop: San Luis Obispo, or SLO.  What a cool little central coast town!  The vibes I got here were a breath of fresh air compared to the hustle and bustle of SoCal.  My first morning in town I headed to Art’s Cyclery to get some trail info, and low-and-behold Intense Cycles were holding a demo day!  Oh I can take YOUR brand new expensive bike out and rip it all day? Looks like I lucked out.  I grabbed a Tracer 275 and headed to Montana de Oro State Park.  This was my first time trying out the much-talked about 27.5 (650) wheel size, and also the biggest travel bike I had ridden at 150mm.  Montana de Oro, or MDO, had me buzzing from the moment I got there.  It sits right on the ocean; a mix of dense forest and sage with wide open views of the water!  The trails were absolutely ripping to the max!  Super flowy, even in the uphill direction.  I was having so much fun on these awesome trails, on this awesome bike, that I barely made it back to the shop in time to drop it back off.  The Tracer 275 is a winner for sure; a killer trail bike in every aspect.

It's soooo Green!

Bike. Trail. Ocean. Done.

Is there anything better in the world??

After a couple days in SLO it was up Highway 1 to Monterey and the Sea Otter Classic.  Highway 1 doesn’t need any mention.  It is a drive that everyone should do once in their life. 

My first experience at Sea Otter was a good one.  A few days of seeing almost every major bike, component, apparel, nutrition, etc. company in the world, shaking hands, shooting the shit, riding bikes and watching races is all you’ll get there.  I was scheduled for the Pro XC race on Saturday.  This race brings the most stacked and biggest Pro field of any race in the US.  Many European World Cup racers made the trip, including Olympic gold medalist Jaroslav Kulhavy and many other top contenders.  It was an amazing feeling just to be in the same race with these guys.  The race started and took half a lap around the Laguna Seca Raceway.  What a feeling!  Being in the middle of 100+ riders all going 30 mph around a race track, some feet away from Olympians from various countries! It’s a good thing that once we hit the first dirt all of those guys were out of my sight, and I could just race my own race.  In the beginning I was a little more cautious than I would’ve liked.  Cautious in a field this big and fast can cost you 20 spots in no time.  I wasn’t feeling at my best but was still feeling strong enough to start regaining a bunch of positions once the climbing commenced.  My ultimate claim to fame was passing Adam Craig on one of these climbs.  Adam is a World Cup caliber rider and just a badass mountain biker that I look up to.  No worries though, once we hit a flat section he turned on the jets and passed me back.  The race was super fast, and before I knew it it was over.  My time of 1:28 was some 12-minutes off the race winner, and good enough for 68^th!  To put that into perspective, a few small errors, being more aggressive at the start, getting into the singletrack at a certain position could mean the difference between 40^th and 70^th.  Jaroslav Kulhavy, Olympic gold medalist, got 25^th.  All in all, it was a good weekend of meeting industry folk and riding my bike in the sun.

Adam Craig wearing baggies in the Short Track!  Baller.

The trails around Monterey are good to Meh at best.  Luckily, just around the bay lies a mountain biking gem like no other: Santa Cruz.  I have honestly been salivating over the riding in Santa Cruz for 3 years now, and finally I got my chance!  My first ride in the area started in Aptos at the Forest is Nisene Marks.  Again, anybody who has never been here should put it on their ultimate “to-do” list.  The ride started with a 14-mile grind up perfectly groomed fireroad through Nisene Marks, in the deep and dark redwood forest.  The ride didn’t bother me a bit, as I was constantly in awe of the magnificence of the lush rich green forest of ferns and 200 ft tall redwoods!  My destination was the Soquel Demonstration Forest; a system of trails known worldwide.  I had never ridden anything like it in my life!  The trails, wide open corridors through the monster redwoods, were soft and tacky throwing all notions of grip out the window.  They flowed so well that all you had to do was shake your hips from side to side and hang on, pushing your own capabilities and willingness to go fast.  Every corner was a berm, forcing you to just throw the bike sideways into it and let it throw you out!  The features were the biggest and scariest I had ever seen, and they were around every corner.  There were log and plank roll-outs dropping 10 feet at times, sending you 20 feet down the trail, gap jumps both big and small, and other jumps and kickers of all sizes.  I did my best to push my own limits, usually hitting the small and medium features.  I finally understood the phrase “send-it”; the action of flowing off a jump and just throwing the bike out in front of you.  It was all a mind-fuck.  I was left grinning and giggling after every downhill run; completely mesmerized.

Forest of Nisene Marks

Enchanted Loop.  Magical.

The next day I was off to the trails on the upper UCSC campus and Wilder ranch.  Again, it was a mind-blowing day of epic proportions.  The Enchanted Loop at Wilder ranch is called that for a reason.  For moments I felt like an Avatar floating through the forests of Pandora on Toruk.  ‘Nuff said!

My amazing four-week adventure through the Southwest and California ended with a journey up to Nevada City and Downieville, where I would get back to back days of riding along both the North and South Yuba rivers.  The South Yuba is one of the most beautiful rivers I’ve ever seen.  Its crystal clear opalescent waters were so inviting after a big day on the bike. If there is any holy water in the world, this has to be it.  But just to make sure my soul wasn’t transformed, I made sure to have a beer with me as I took the holy bath.

South Yuba River Magic.

This trip was originally planned as a training adventure, wherein I would train and race when I couldn’t in snowy Colorado.  It turned out to be something different.  Instead of focusing on mileage, elevation climbed, intensity and speed, I became more interested in the fun and thrill of the journey; appreciating everything for what it was.  Whether I was ripping pristine singletrack or carrying my bike through the woods, it was all part of a bigger picture.  I think this trip did a lot to connect me back to the roots of the sport, and why I love it so much.  Get out in nature, challenge yourself, and enjoy the journey.  Cheers.