2005 is over!

The old adage is that time goes by uncreasingly fast through the years. So much happened this year and all in all it was a great year. Our household is now up to 4 with Marc's birth in October. Alex has a little brother and can now be a "mentor". Work has been great and intense, just the way I like it. I came back to mountain bike racing after many years of leisuring and had fun applying my competitive side to the sport I like most. We all spent a few weeks in France in March and I wish we could have stayed a bit more with family. Trade-offs. It all flew by.

We are now enjoying some time off before 2006 begins. Slow riding, good food, time with Alex, Marc and Layla. Some days of calm and rest. I wish you the same!

Too busy to breathe

Sometimes life leaves a bit of room for leisure activities, sometimes it doesn't. It's a crazy time right now, no time for riding bikes, no time to post about the new mountain bike either... ah. I'll be back.

Race Stories: X-Bar Shoot Out 18 September 2005

In life we must do things for love. Here is the X-bar shoot out story.

Warm up, start...

The first 25 minutes of the race were encouraging. I found myself in a good position, not too far from the leaders, despite missing a curve that lacked signage and having to backtrack and return on the right course. Then... rear tire cut. Flat. Again after Kelly Creek? Well, no time to think, I pull out of the track, get the new tube in, check the tire for thorn, pump it back up. Over 5 minutes lost. Back on track. As I was trying to make up some gap and bomb on a descent, I hit a large rock sideways, first through the shoe, which ejected it from the pedal, then in a fraction of a second... through the rear derailleur. Damn. Lost all gears except #1. At this point I thought I would at least finish the race, no matter in which position, to score a few points. End of first lap, I struggle to keep a decent speed with only one gear... not even the right one if I was a "single speed" rider. Next rocky section... FLAT again. No more spare tube --- bike destroyed, game over.

Lessons from this day:
- Must-get-puncture-resistant-tires
- Must-finish-race
- Must-love-what-you-do

Driving 500 miles in one day for a double flat, exploded bike and DNF, you have to really do it for love. I love riding, and that's why I'll come back on the bike, and to the next race I get a chance to make.

Race Stories: The Kelly Creek Classic 2005

The summer was hot in Texas. Hot as hell. Yet there are still places in this very big state that get water on a regular basis. The trails by Kelly Creek are one example. I had heard that this was a technical race so I took the chance to pre-ride it last month. It had rained the day before. I was originally planning on doing 2+ laps, but after the first one I stopped and told Layla "if I do one more lap I'm going to hurt myself". I had a "Russian" party the night before and still had some traces of wine and other spirits in my blood, which do not mix with muddy rocks and wet roots. So I called it a day.

The actual race took place last weekend. I came to the event with moderate preparation, knowing that coming unprepared would be a asking for trouble. I also knew it would be a fairly long and tiring race, so I took the start easy. Most of the riders immediately popped up and after 30 seconds I was at the back of the group. It felt like my pace, and I wasn't going to burn out so quickly. Then came the first climb. To my surprise, I must have moved from 15th to 5th just through this first climb. Positions then became more or less stable for the main length of the race. I noticed that on flat portions, riders would pass me back. Something is wrong with my flat riding skills. I do need to work my speed on flat terrain for the next races. And then I caught the guys who passed me on the flat... at the next steep climb.

The 2nd lap challenged everyone's endurance skills. Some riders got flats, some broke their bikes, some slipped on the wet rocks and crashed... I even saw a couple riders throwing up on the side of the track. Were they overdoing it? Or they just had one of these delicious "PowerGel"? At many times, I felt like I was going to join them... gatorade, one powergel, more gatorade, another powergel... I really forced myself on the last one. There is one word is English that perfectly described how I felt eating it: YUCK! Couldn't they invent sports food and drinks that taste good? I'd buy these things.

And then, the last mile. I passed a couple of riders who were in other categories (did not gain positions through these passes), giving a final push with the energy I had left. Comes a high speed corner, I suddenly felt the back of the bike soft... slipping out... hard as metal. Flat tire on the final mile! Damn it. The first attempt was to try to ride on it, but within a few seconds I realized I was going to destroy the whole wheel by doing this, and I was dead slow anyhow. I jump out of the bike and start running, pushing the bike. The riders I passed, pass me back. To complete the debacle, my right leg starts cramping. At this point it felt so weird that it made me smile. I eventually hopped to the finish line with the bike, and probably lost ~3 minutes with these incidents. But I guess it was lucky to flat at the very end vs. in the middle of the race. And avoided crashing.

Result: 7th, about 10 minutes away from the category winner. Out of 2 hours, it's pretty close and enough to make me happy. Still a lot of work to do, but the goal is to use the Fall season as a learning experience for the Spring next year, when I hope to have my new bike -- 10 pounds lighter than what I ride today.

Nico drives a Hummer

In the "real life", I like small cars: more responsive, more agile, more friendly to the environment... I could go on. However, there are certain cases where the larger vehicle shows its appeal. When buying furniture, bricks, dirt... for example. In that case, none of this applied.

Larry rented a Hummer for the sales meeting. As the team was getting ready to go to dinner, a bus was awaiting us outside. As I came out, I saw Larry in his weapon of mass destruction... so I want to him and said "can you give me a ride?". Even better, Larry offered me to drive. Cooooool. So for once, I was the mean car on the road, we ran over a couple of porsche (they felt like speed bumps) and reportedly, three Clios ended up in the bushes because of us. I'm kidding, of course. But heck, for 5 miles a gallon, what you see is what you get. We had rap music all trip long, it was a funny experience.

Night Campfire in San Francisco

I'm fortunate to work in a company that adheres to the motto "work hard, play hard". We just finished a long series of business meetings in California, then Linux World (trade show). Bertrand (middle of the picture) recently got married and Ethan (right on pic) and your humble servant (left) decided to celebrate this in a special way: campfire at night on the beach of San Francisco... what better time than the first week of August?

For those of you who know San Francisco, the clothes will not surprise you. For others, it is quite typical to bring a sweater to San Francisco even in the hottest months of the year. It's almost always foggy, windy, chilly... cold. It was a lot of fun, and we definitely enjoyed our fire!

City Of God

Some movies are so bad that you can fall asleep better than with silence in the room. Others, are so good that they leave you with a sense of amazement and fascination. City of God, is one of them. If any of you are looking for a good movie to watch, get this one.

Logging miles

How much is a lot? How much is not enough? And how much is too much? For the past few weeks I've been executing on a training book I got myself to design a training plan and get better, and faster. The basic principle is to split the training in 2 phases: the first phase is high volume, low intensity. Lots of very long, easy rides, to build endurance. Then phase 2, is to reduce volume of training and increase intensity of effort. All-out sprints, intervals, uphills, strength work.

So here I am in phase 1, logging miles. With the Texas summer, I have to get up early and ride before it gets hot (and it gets hot very quickly here) or early evenings before the night comes. I am curious to see if these will make a difference. The fall races will tell, I guess. 5 more weeks of training, which is not much time to do both phases right.

That's OK. Work and family come first... biking gets the rest, and I like it that way.

Tour de France 2005: where are the rivals?

This year again, Lance is the man. Faster on time trials, faster on mountains, nobody can get close to him. Jean Marie LeBlanc, director of the event, commented earlier in the year that when a cyclist dominates the way Lance does, it is a combination of two factors-- 1. one rider does nearly everything right. Lance is definitely very, very well prepared and does few mistakes, if any. But also: 2. other riders screw up and make big mistakes. Why did Jan Ullrich tire himself on the long Tour of Switzerland right before the tour (while Lance only did a week-long race one month before the Tour de France)? Looks like a pretty big mistake. Why was Ullrich so out of shape at the beginning of the Tour, yet after spending time with everyone else, is showing very competitive at the end of the event? Bad planning, it seems. Or, how can Rasmussen climb the Alps so fast but without drinking anything? Is it coincidence that he then weakens in the next few stages? Probably not.

I admire Lance a lot. Smart guy who does a lot of inspirational stuff. It's smat from Lance to praise his rivals, they need to be praised. But... they do make mistakes that are even visible to the average spectator that I am, and just think about all the things I can't see on TV. So: where are the rivals?

One rock in a million

Some things are meant to happen. It may be a small incident, or a big accident... when the day has come, there is no way around it. This week was just one of those small incidents but it really felt it had to be so. Unusually for a Texas summer, it has rained a lot these past few days. The roads were a bit dirtier than normal as a result. I waited for a better weather to come out for a ride late this week. Looking at the track, nothing looked to be a cause for concern besides the fact that curves should be taken cautiously to avoid slipping on a debris. But to my surprise, the front tire got suddenly cut off after about 3 miles. Flat tire, game over for the day. Walking back to the point where the incident happened, I found a minuscule rock... like there were so many others on the road. Generally, none would be harmful enough to cut open a tire -- obviously. Road biking would be impossible. But this one rock had the sharpest edges of all, looking like a pyramid. I could have ridden the entire day on this track without incident. But this day, I walked back over 3 miles pushing my bike with cycling shoes. Good thing was, while it ruined my training for the day, it was in the end, no big deal.

More on progress,,, and limits

Ayrton Senna was my model when I grew up. Every child and teenager needs someone to look up to, and in my case it was Senna. I had seen him first when I was around 6 or 7 years old on an F1 race and from the beginning had developed a fascination for his ability to fight, and push the limits.

I usually like to time myself on the bike on a track I can come back to on a regular basis to monitor in what shape I am. I used to do this road track on my mountain bike until this year, when I got a road bike. My all time best was 44min15sec on the mountain bike. I thought this was as fast as I could go. Then the road bike did magic and brought me down to 42min45sec on the very first ride. However the next rides showed that progress was so much more difficult. Making progress is like fighting logarithms sometimes: you reach a plateau of performance and day after day, the facts show you that despite more efforts and application, times remain the same. I had come to think that going under the 40min bar would be an impossible dream. To my astonishment, it happened a couple of weeks ago with a 39min55. This day, I felt so fast, so strong, and so exhausted too, that I told myself "OK, this is the limit. There is no way I am going any faster". And for the past 2 weeks, I have not.

But back to Senna: he once explained this is a common phenomenon in sports and racing. It gets more and more difficult to make progress and after some time you experience diminishing returns on gains / efforts spent. And you say "this is the limit, it doesn't get any better". Yet, as soon as you hit this limit, it disappears and something in you thinks you can go a little bit further, a little bit faster.

To my continued surprise yesterday, I beat another all time best of 39min48sec... 7 seconds faster out of 40 mins! Yet, Senna was right. And today it again feels this is as good as it will ever get.

Maybe so. Maybe not. Time will tell.

Progress happens

Yesterday we went with a friend to the Emma Long Track in the Austin City Park. Last time I rode it was about 2 months ago before the couple spring races and a bit of riding. To my surprise things went a lot better both at the technical and resistance level. Progress happens!

Thinking of Triathlon

Biking is awesome, I love it and always will. But one weakness of cycling is that it is not a "complete" sport. Pretty close though: healthy for the heart, develops great leg strength and endurance... however. If you don't work at it, cycling will make you stiff and lose some flexibility. And, it does not exercise the upper body much. So I've been thinking about expanding cycling to running and to swimming. The idea sounds good... but again it's about finding time. More later.

Race stories: Broaken Oak Challenge 15 May 2005

Renewing with an old time hobby: bike races. I liked the Bing Ring a lot, although the race itself was just a joke given how unprepared I was that day. While there was not much I would be able to do in 15 days to change, at least this time I would not party the night before. Also because I’m just not at the expert level yet, I picked the “sport” category, where top riders are almost as fast but the race isn’t quite as long.

My goal for this race was to move away from the “joke” the previous one was and get a bit more competitive. The track was definitely more technical than the Houston race, which was a good thing overall. I was also more accustomed to how the race was starting, and I now knew that the Texas Championship series are quite competitive events with more highly prepared riders than casual weekend bikers coming here to see what they can do.

I debated taking my camelbak hydration bag or just a plain bike bottle in the last minutes before the race. With only 2 laps this time, it would take me about 1h30 I figured to complete the race, so I opted for the old fashion bottle… this would suffice. Time to start the race…

This time, from the beginning it felt much better. I guess it could only feel better than last time in that case. This time I was in the race and there was about an equal amount of folks in front of me as there were behind. Even after several minutes I could also still see the leading riders ahead, which told me I was closer to race pace. Then came technical sections. Initially I gained positions on tight uphills, where I seemed to be doing pretty good. Then came some more technical section where I messed up. Lots of fast ups and downs where you can only go with momentum. I lost it, and it was a costly error. Some riders where right behind me and as I moved to the side to let them go, not one, not two but a lot of them took the spot… probably more than I should have let go, but they did. The rest of the lap went OK, and I was still in the race. One of the best times in racing is when you pass a rider, then he passes you back, you pass him back, and it goes on. It happened with two riders and it was a lot of fun. I was following one of them on the descent and as he tried to take a corner too fast he missed the curve and went off track. He let us go. The other rider stayed in front of me and by the end of the lap I tried to accelerate on a final push.

I was starting to get quite tired as my bike computer indicated 1h25m… I thought “only 5 more minutes and it’s the finish line”. I upped the cadence. In what looked like a harmless corner, the front wheel slipped and I crashed. I landed on the hands, not hurt. I caught the bike and jumped back on it, telling myself not to overdo it. Within the next minute in another easy corner… I lose the front wheel again, crash. “What is going on?”, I told myself. As I grabbed the bike again, I looked behind to see if someone would catch up on me. It doesn’t feel good to get passed in the last minutes… no one was there. The crazy thing is that I almost lost the front of the bike a third time after the 2 crashes… something was wrong, but this time I corrected it before it was too late. The finish line was there… final sprint.

This race was actually not too bad, with an 8^th place out of 13 I think. It was especially positive as riders in front where not this far ahead, expect for the top 2 riders who definitely were a lot faster. Maybe with some training and improvements on the equipment, I’ll get to where I want to be. Not at the very front – I now know these races are extremely competitive and I would need to lower other priorities (work, family, house maintenance), and right now bike comes after these. But some good rankings are possible. It will motivate me to do more races. Stay tuned.

Race stories: Big Ring Challenge 01 May 2005

Big Ring Challenge 2005

Sometimes you just don’t know what you’re doing. Has it ever happened to you? Mis-judging a situation? Short term memory? A little bit of both? Well, these situations teach you as long as you can remember. The Big Ring Challenge was one of them.

I’ve been riding bikes for now more than 25 years. Gosh, am I getting some age here? Bikes have been one of my first toys to play with, way of transportation when it’s all I had, hobby, get-away, or just plain fun. I raced a bit when I was a teenager but decided to focus on studies. Years went by, many of them without any biking.

I found out about the Big Ring Challenge race by chance, so to speak. We were going to a friend’s birthday in Houston that weekend, so it looked like a good idea to combine the birthday party on Saturday night with the race Sunday morning. I pre-registered for the race and had to pick a category. Not aware of what they meant, I found myself experienced enough to pick the “expert” category. Heck, I’ve ridden just about anywhere from the European Alps to the Japanese mountains, and now the US. Terrain won’t matter and online reviews for the trail said it was not that hard anyhow. I just needed to be fast enough. That proved to be the difficulty.

But back to Saturday night for a moment. Do you know these parties where you go and the theme drink is Vodka? If you have good Russian friends, then you must know what I am talking about. While I warned folks there that I had a bike race the next day, I was weak enough to let myself convince to get a drink. And a few others…. Thanks to my friend Igor. I once went mountain biking with Igor and he assured me that drinking Vodka would actually help me during the race. Oh well, I was not going to the race for the win, so a few extra minutes wouldn’t make a difference.

Sunday morning… ouch. Slight hangover feel. I rush to get ready, get everyone in the car… Layla my wife, Alex my 2 year old son… and here we go. I was not able to eat anything for breakfast, the stomach wouldn’t allow. Before the race we stopped at a gas station and Layla bought a few energy bars I could then absorb. At the time my #1 goal was to get enough water to clear up the remaining vodka traces from my body. Then we arrived on the race spot.

As I was getting prepared, I was a bit surprised by how many riders had warm up stands and were already sweating on their bike. Maybe the race was more competitive than I thought it’d be. The past few races I had done, long ago, had of course well prepared riders but a mass of recreational racers who came there pretty much like me partying and drinking the night before. It didn’t seem to be the case that day. As I rushed to the registration area someone stopped me and said “helmet!”. Of course, helmet at all times, no matter when or how slow you’re going. A good rule, I think.

We were about to start. Continuing my observation of riders around me, I noticed high-end equipment compared to my 6 year old bike that only cost a few hundred dollars at the time. Hmm. Shaved legs for the most part… “these guys are serious riders”, I told myself. “15 seconds to start”, staff said. 3, 2, 1…Bang!

Given lack of training and “night before”, I started easy. As I saw everyone accelerated significantly towards the first corner, I upped the pace too. There must have been a couple of guys behind me by then, no more. But of course every 2 minutes new categories of experts started right behind us, and before I knew it these very fast riders were right behind me. I let them go one after another. I just had to race at my own pace, which was off the race pace, clearly. Bad decision: vodka is bad, bad, bad and does not mix with riding. Especially in race conditions. Laps went by… we needed to complete 4 of them.

I intended to eat at some point as intuitively I knew that in a 2 hour race no food meant enormous erosion of performance. Yet I passed lap 3 without feeling hunger and was struggling anyhow. It felt eating something would make no difference, just that I would have to decelerate for about a minute to eat the cereal bar I had in the pocket. I kept going, thinking “oh well it’s the last lap, I’ll worry about it later”. Mistake it was, and I won’t do this again for the next few years at least! By mid lap 4, I was completely high, exhausted, slow, passed countless times, just trying to keep the bike on the track. I took uphills slow, just the way I could. To compensate I was trying to keep a fast pace in downhills, and lost the bike a couple times… luckily without crashing. The last 2 miles never ended, it felt they lasted for an hour each. Then finally the finish.

Results came in. Incredible, I was not last, but almost. It was comforting that other riders were strong, very strong and so much more prepared and equipped. It was a good learning experience in the sense it helped me understand where the bar is. And despite the struggle I actually liked the event, well organized, cool riders, I had fun. All I needed was to come back another time, better prepared, and not intoxicated.

New bike

Posted by Layla ('cause Nico never updates this blog):
- Nico is very excited about his new road bike! He's been waiting months for it and now he finally has it and he beat his best time on his mountain bike at Veloway by 1 minute and 30 seconds...

profile picture

Race Stories: Muddy Buddy 2004

Our expectations were high, as usual. I never compete to lose, and had trained over the past few weeks to regain some good physical condition. My biking performance had become satisfactory, and the running numbers were looking not too bad. So, this was good enough to show up at the race. I had told Layla that I saw mainly 3 challenges for the race: 1. be able to start the race in the lead and not be stuck behind slow riders. With 800 teams, you better not miss the start. 2. avoid mechanical problems / crash, and 3. avoid taking the wrong curve by missing a direction sign. It was a while since I last raced, but I remembered experiences and each of these 3 can make you lose a lot of time, all of a sudden.

So during the pre-race, I ensured to position myself at the front, right in the middle of the group. It was the best spot, and no one fought for it. I took it. I did not recognize the track upfront (and should have), but the track looked fairly easy and rideable. When the starting bang hit, I rushed through the first corner and took the lead of the race. Well, challenge #1 was behind me and I had the track to myself. It felt good and I pushed ahead. After a couple minutes, I briefly looked behind and saw no one, the gap was over 10 seconds to the 2nd rider. Good, I thought. It was the high moment of the race, and then came trouble. Troubles I should say.

We had not really prepared the bike, and showed up to the Muddy Buddy race (emphasis: muddy) with a mountain equipped with a slick tire (!) as well as slippery plastic pedals, since clipless were not allowed. Came the first downhill, generally my specialty, I started having the disorienting experience of my feet slipping out of pedals and as best I could hold the bike, my butt hit the saddle. Put feet back on the pedals, tried to get going, but it continued happening. By then, a guy had caught up on me and passed ahead in the downhill. So much for my strong point. During the next hill, I passed him back and to my surprise... the first section of the race was already over! We had to climb an obstacle, and start... running. I passed the obstacle ahead. It was the last moment leading the race.

I had trained to run decently. Running has never been my specialty, in fact I consider myself naturally handicapped for this sport, since from early age I have seen others typically perform better than I did, with identical amount of training. So, despite the training, what I suspected happened: I got passed by one guy. And another one. And then another one. It kept going on and on. I lost a lot of time, I knew it, but there was nothing else to do then. The end of run approached, and we climbed another hurdle. Biking time again...

In what position were we at the moment, I can hardly tell. I had been passed a countless amount of times. Besides, with the mud now on the shoes, the slippery pedals were not only tricky during downhills, but also during uphills where it was getting difficult to push without having feet popping out of pedals. As you can see I remember all the things that went wrong, pretty much. This is what we are going to correct for next year! Another one was the fact that Geovanny and I had different saddle heights and to avoid losing 15 seconds fixing the saddle on such short bike sections, I did section 3 about 5 inches lower on the saddle as I usually am. But still, I passed a lot of riders on the way, and caught some positions back. Obstacle #3 ended in water. Now the fun could begin: running with completely wet shoes.

Section 4 (running for me) was the longest and hardest. It probably lasted between 10 and 15 minutes, but felt an eternity. It was about hanging in there, trying to keep up with someone's pace, passing me. A lesson learned for next year, I will train on more difficult trails and put more emphasis on running, obviously. Strangely I did not see the running part as the most challenging one, yet it proved to be so. Final obstacle to climb before the last biking section. And then, the mud pit.

Section 5 was the last chance to get some positions back. I was so tired that this time, I did stop and take the 15 seconds to put the saddle back in position. I just did not have the strength to ride low this time. Back on the bike, I gained a few more positions, one after the other, painfully. I paid some attention not overdoing it, especially on the way down, which was paved with wet rocks. At no point did we fall, it was not time to do so. Finally I could see the "bike drop" sign and heard the noise of the crowd. Geovanny was waiting for me since we had to pass the mud pit together, crawling through this tainted water. It was actually not that bad. For the second time in the race, I looked behind us to see if another team was close enough to take our position. I could not see any, and took it somewhat easy. I felt very tired and the very last steps running after the mud pit were at survival speed. Still, we ran, and finished.

So while rakings are not online at the time I write these notes, we saw some preliminary rankings after the race and ended up 8th in our category. I imagine we are around 20th in the overall rankings. Out of 800+ teams in the event, I guess there is enough to be satisfied! We did it, we didn't crash, and given the equipment and first time on the track, it was great. But for those who know me, you know I am very competitive, and I play to win. Geovanny and I will be back next year, more prepared, with an adequate bike, targeting at least a podium. In the meantime we need to check the other races in the region. This event somewhat made me get back in touch with a fun hobby: sport races. More to come; stay tuned.

Nico in Singapore in 2003

Nico at the F1 race in Malaysia in 2003