Author Archives: Gene Dan

#14 Dallas/Fort Worth Criterium: Race Report

26 March, 2010 4:43 AM / Leave a Comment /

Hey everyone,

This is a race report of the second event of DFW weekend, the No Frills Criterium. First of all, I had never raced two events on the same day, so this would be a challenge for me. I would say that I probably gave a 90-95% effort in the time trial, so I was pretty tired afterward, and I had about and hour and a half to catch my breath. We were about to go eat, but we couldn’t find Joseph after he had finished the time trial. Sean and the rest of the team decided to go eat, while I waited behind for Joseph since our event would be starting soon.

After waiting for about an hour, there was no sign of Joseph anywhere. I was getting pretty worried, but I had to make my way to the next race so I decided to go without him. After warming up on the course for about thirty minutes, the race directors called my group to the line. Remembering how badly my first crit went, I set aside some goals for this event in order to improve. Jay was there, so there would be a very good chance of him winning. I knew going in to the race that I probably had very little chance of winning, as I needed to improve both my handling skills and power maintenance in order to be in contention. Thus, I decided that my goal for today would be to not get dropped.

The course was much more technical this time around and contained about 3-4 U-turns, 2 of them at high speed. When we started, we were going pretty fast, but we weren’t going at breakneck speed, so I was able to hang on the pack for about 10 minutes…much longer than the last time. However, a UH guy in front of me was getting tired and he started to fall backward…as soon as I knew it, we were both off the back and I had to catch back on. Unfortunately, I was still smoked from the time trial so I couldn’t stay on. I think had I stayed closer to the front I could have lasted another five minutes in the pack.

After falling back, I saw Jay pick up the pace and it looked like no one could catch him. The pack was frantically trying to maintain a reasonable gap behind Jay, but it just kept getting bigger, and riders were being spit off the back. Fortunately, I was able to catch a few guys coming off the back, and as I passed them I told them to get behind me so we could work together. Unfortuntately, none of them were able to pull and fell back, and I soon found myself without allies. At least I was stronger than someone. There was an Aggie hanging off the back and I tried to catch up to him, but by then the race was pretty much decided as Jay won emphatically.

Despite not finishing with the pack, there were a few things I did better than last time. The course was more difficult, and I was able to stay with the pack for a longer amount of time than at A&M. My cornering improved, but not enough yet to be competitive at criteriums. I would say out of all the types of races I’ve done, criteriums are my worst. It’s only to my benefit to improve on my weaknesses, so I will keep racing crits in order to gain the handling experience that I need to be competitive. The skills I’ll learn in these races will even carry over to road races and time trials.

After the race, I found Joseph in the parking lot and I asked him where he went. Hilariously, when he finished the time trial, he had no idea that he had finished and kept going full-blast for another 30 minutes! That means he probably burned more calories than me today. Apparently, one of the race officials told him to keep going as the finish was ahead – right at the finish line. Thus, Joseph got confused and didn’t know where the race ended until he was out in the middle of nowhere. I remember that same race official saying something similar to me as I finished, and it was slightly confusing but I managed to finish at the right location.

I think the Men’s B race deserves some merit. Ken, Jacob, Hogan, Geisinger, Corey, and Whitney were in that race. This was probably the most exciting race of the day. There was probably an attack on every lap of the course. An exciting racing report can be found on Ken’s Blog as he actually participated in the race.

Ken can be a strong finisher, but he’s not a pure sprinter, so he knew if he wanted to win, he would have to outsmart the pack and tire out the sprinters before the bunch sprint. The pace was very intense and after a few laps, Corey fell of the back, along with Jacob. An Aggie put in an aggressive attack, but he was reeled in after a few seconds, then Ken threw in the first of his many attacks and he was able to stay away for a little while, but was caught.

Jacob looking fly on his Fisher…

In the middle of the race, one of the MSU riders put in a strong attack and caused a split in the field. There were 8 riders in the front, with Hogan, Ken, and Whitney in the front…a strong group. I was very surprised that Roy Bracey, winner of the A&M criterium, was struggling to stay in this group. It was then that I realized that Ken had a very strong chance of winning if he could stay in the front. It was about this time that Geisinger fell off the back. After the pack came back together, Whitney threw in a powerful attack that lasted a few seconds. Many of the race officials were very impressed that she was able to be aggressive with the men’s group:

Whitney mixing it up with the boys…

I think as the race went on Ken put in more attacks, and when there were four laps left, he went all out and put in one final attack, and he was able to stay away for a long time. The officials were criticizing him because he wasn’t as good of a handler as the best riders in the group. He was taking wide turns, and not taking full advantage of cutting the apex. Thus, they downplayed his chances to win. I wanted him to win so badly just to spite all of those non-believers. When there was one lap to go, Ken was still in front! We were all cheering for him. When everyone came around for the final sprint, Ken had such an advantage over the field that he was able to give an emphatic victory salute – he held up his horns! Congratulations to Ken for a great ride!

Ken soloed his way to an impressive victory!

Posted in: Logs

#13 DFW Horse Country Time Trial: Race Report

25 March, 2010 3:05 AM / Leave a Comment /

Profile of the course.

Hey everyone,

This is a race report of the first event of the Dallas/Fort Worth race weekend. So, the Friday before the event was a pretty busy day for me. I had to leave at 3:00 PM, so I needed to make sure that I would be able to run all of my errands, as well as put in a light pre-race ride before I left. Since I wanted more control over what time I arrived at the race, I decided that this time I would drive and transport my bike myself. Thus, I headed out to Target and Home Depot in order to pick up some travelling supplies, and I purchased a plank of wood, along with a quick release skewer to hold my bike in place as I drove. When I got home, it took me about an hour to construct the bike holder:

Packed up and ready to go.

I only had about an hour to go out so I did a quick ride with a few sprints. When I back home, I packed up and drove to the CPE parking lot where I met the rest of my teammates. For Category A, Sean was our one-man team. We had a very strong Category B team with Hogan, Geisinger, Ken, and Jacob. For Category D we had me and Joseph. Whitney would ride in Women’s A, and Danielle would ride in Women’s B.

We left at about 3:45 and we had horrible traffic the whole way. After taking us two hours to get to Waco, we decided to take a break and get dinner at Jason’s Deli. After another two hours of driving, we finally got to Dallas where we stayed at Joseph’s brother’s apartment where we spent the night. However, I didn’t sleep all that well. Fortunately, I was able to wake up at 5:00 AM to go get breakfast and arrive at the race course.

There were some registration issues so the race started about an hour and a half late, which gave me ample time to warm up. It was pretty cold outside, about 50 degrees farenheit. I had never done a time trial before, so I asked Ken for some advice. He pretty much told me to go as hard as I thought I could for about thirty minutes. I had also read elsewhere that most people who are new to time trialing usually started out too hard, which made it difficult to put in enough effort towards the end. For those of you who aren’t familiar with time trialing, a time trial is a type of short race in which everyone starts individually, as opposed to a mass start race in which everyone starts together. For this particular time trial, the course was roughly 12 miles long with riders starting 30 seconds apart. Riders are not allowed to draft, and drafting will result in either a time penalty or disqualification. The person who completes the course in the shortest amount of time wins the race.

When the start times were posted up, I learned that Joseph would be my thirty-second man, and I told him to go hard and try not to get caught by me. When the race officials called my group, Joseph and I lined up. When it was my turn to go, one of the race officials held me upright by my saddle to let me clip in. It was pretty cool because I didn’t have to mount my bike in the traditional way. Anyways, another official started a countdown from five seconds, and then I was off.

The profile of the course isn’t as bad as it looks on that graph up there. You can see that the elevation difference is only 100 feet, which isn’t far at all. I would say that non-climbing specialists and even pure sprinters wouldn’t have a difficult time with it. It was mostly just rolling hills.

I tried to go hard, but not too hard so as to burn myself out. After a few minutes of riding I could see Joseph in front of me. I knew I was a little bit more experienced than Joseph, so I knew I would probably catch him as the race went along. I didn’t want to catch him too early just in case I tried too hard, so I used Joseph as a sort of carrot to gauge my progress. After about 4 miles, I was only about 20m away from Joseph, so I decided to speed up to make the catch. Unfortunately, as I was about to do this, my own thirty-second man from OBU came from behind me and passed me up, so for a moment it looked as if the three of us were riding together. It only took a few seconds to spread us apart, and I decided then to pass Joseph. I decided to let the OBU guy go because I wasn’t sure if I could hold his pace. At the 5 mile mark I saw another guy from Oklahoma University and I was about to catch him. I was very excited because I didn’t expect to catch two riders in the TT…I wasn’t even expecting to catch one. It’s a little unfair though, because the OU guy wasn’t using clipless pedals, and his bike wasn’t as good as mine. So after the 6th mile, I passed him up. The last half of the course was brutal. I looked behind me a few times to see if my minute man was anywhere close, but when I looked back I saw nothing…a good sign. When I looked ahead, it seemed like the OBU guy caught another guy, which means he caught four riders! I knew he would finish with a very strong time. I thought about accellerating to catch the guy in front of me, but I decided that it would take too much effort, as he was going pretty fast as well.

When I reached the finish line, I was so out of it that I couldn’t put in the effort to sprint. It looks like I tried too hard at the beginning even though I didn’t think I was trying hard at all…a rookie mistake. I’ll think of that next time when I go to Fort Davis Hammerfest next month.

I didn’t know the results until Monday, when I learned that I got 10th place, which was the middle of the pack. Joseph finished three or four places after me. A Rice guy won the race, beating Jay Coleman of OU by one second, who had previously won almost every race since the beginning of racing season. For men’s B, Ken podiumed by getting third, a very good result for him considering that he was sick the week before. I think maybe I could have done what Ken did: he was passed by the eventual winner, Roy Bracey, but he decided to use Roy afterward as a carrot, and thus finished with a very good time. I think if I had done that with the OBU guy, I could have gotten a better result. It wasn’t a bad result for a first time trial, but it was a little lower than I thought I would be since I passed two guys. Anyways, I was slightly disappointed because I finished right behind three Rice guys, and I wanted to beat at least one of them in the time trial because we make fun of them a lot whenever we play football against them. I guess cycling is a kind of way for them to get revenge against UT…sort of, not that many Rice kids actually care about football. Nevertheless, since I finished right behind them I know that I’m just nipping at their heels…I’ll just keep training until I can beat them.

Posted in: Cycling, Logs

#12 Texas A&M Criterium: Race Report

22 March, 2010 4:50 AM / Leave a Comment /

Hello everyone,

This race report covers the second day of the Texas A&M race weekend. After the road race, my legs were so sore that I wasn’t sure if I would be able to handle the criterium the day afterward. For those of you who don’t know what a criterium is, it’s a type of short race held on a short track of about 1 mile long. The total race time is only 20-60 minutes, so you’re pretty much going full-blast for the entire race. The courses tend to be very technical, and bike handling skills can play an important part in a racer’s overall result.

I didn’t sleep well that night since it was my first race weekend and I was worried about how I would perform. Since Marc, my roommate and fellow D racer, would have to go early in the morning, we woke up at 5:30 AM, got breakfast and headed out for the course at around 6:30. The course was at the George Bush Library on the Texas A&M campus.

When we arrived, Sean realized that he had left the keys to the trailer at our Hotel, so I was pretty annoyed because I wouldn’t get to warm up at all before the race started. For criteriums, warming up is very important since you’ll be going very fast as soon as the race begins. When we arrived, I already saw Jay Coleman of Oklahoma University warming up. He’s probably the best rider in my category and he’s won most of the races so far, including the road race the day before.

Anyways, Josh arrived with the keys about 10 minutes before the start time and I tried to warm up the best I could. Robbie ended up having a flat tire so he spent his warm-up time fixing the flat. Luckily, Marc brought his bike in his own car so he was able to warm up for about an hour. When they called us to line up I noticed that the Rice team was there. I thought this was a little unfair, since the Rice team wasn’t there to race the day before under the brutal conditions we had. Anyways, that’s collegiate cycling for you…When we started, the pace was very fast from the beginning. I was probably only able to stay in contact with the main group for about half a lap, until I ended up in a splinter group with Marc and a handful of other riders. Unfortunately I have very poor cornering skills and was losing time at every single corner. Eventually I couldn’t hold on to Marc’s group and fell off the back.

At the end of the race I learned that Robbie stayed in contact with the front group and finished 7th or 8th, I forget, but considering that he had almost no warm-up time, the result is very impressive for Robbie. Jay Coleman of Oklahoma ended up winning, and Marc finished with his splinter group, and I finished shortly after them – a very disappointing result on my part. My main points of error were cornering and maintaining a high-level of output. I’m usually good at accellerating, but I’m not so great at sustaining power…I’ll have to improve on these aspects the next time, I guess.

The Men’s C group contained one of our riders, Matt, who stayed at the front the whole race and finished an impressive 5th. The A&M C team was very strong and they controlled the field the whole time, sweeping the podium.

When the B group lined up, we had Josh Hogan, Josh Geisinger, Daniel, Jacob, and Trent – a very strong team. Josh Hogan and Daniel were able to stay in the front group for the entire race. However, one of the MSU riders, Roy Bracey broke off the front and went solo for most of the race…that guy’s ridiculously strong. He flatted at least twice in the road race and still managed to finish second. The race pretty much had Roy off the front, with Daniel and Hogan’s group chasing behind. Geisinger was in the main peloton, and Jacob and Trent fell off the back early on, but they were eventually able to catch back on at the end. However, Roy was so strong that he lapped the main group, so the race officials decided to neutralize the main group and let only Roy, along with the chase group containing Hogan and Daniel, to finish. Thus, Roy won spectacularly, and Hogan and Daniel scored two impressive top-5 finishes.

The Men’s A group contained Michael, Joeseph, Joey, Sean, and Kyle. The A group riders are very impressive…some of them are on the verge of going professoinal. It’s pretty much top of the line. The race went as follows: a breakaway group that contained Joesph and a handful of other riders went off the front at the beginning…and stayed off the front. Most of the big teams had people in the break so the peloton did not put on a serious chase effort to catch them. Joey was having some difficulty at the beginning and abandoned early. The breakaway group was allowed so much time that they lapped the field, making it a mess for the race officials. I was confused as well so I didn’t get to see who won the race. Anyways, Joeseph scored a very good result from his breakaway effort.

As for my first weekend of bike racing, there were some good things and there were a lot of things that could have gone better. I scored a good result in the road race, but I need to work on my handling skills, as well as general race-sense such as warming up, communicating, riding with the pack, and so on and so forth. I’ve already had another weekend of racing after this, and the reports will be up soon.

After the men's A race: Michael, Joeseph, Kyle, and Sean.

Posted in: Cycling, Logs

#11 Texas A&M Tunis-Roubaix: Race Report

19 March, 2010 4:46 AM / 3 Comments /

Hello everyone,

This is a report of the first collegiate cycling race I’ve participated in. Last January, I decided to join the Texas Cycling Team in order to find something to motivate myself as I finish my college career. I’ve also got a 60-page thesis to write so I’ve decided to devote some time every day to writing in this blog in order to work on my prolific-ness with respect to writing.

I’m still healing from a series of injuries that I’ve sustained since the beginning of last year, first beginning with a hand injury that ended my musical career in January 2009, and then an ankle injury in February followed by a double-knee injury in June. By then I felt like I couldn’t do anything productive in life and was ready to call it quits, but I decided not to give up. I went through several months of physical therapy and now I’m back on the bike, ready to compete. Due to a three-year absence away from sports, since I was devoted to a musical career, I probably had less mileage than the rest of my teammates, so I was apprehensive about the upcoming race at Tunis. Nevertheless, I decided that I would have to take risks to accomplish anything worthwhile in life, so I decided to register for the race even though I didn’t feel completely ready. I felt concerned that I wouldn’t be able to endure the race even though it was only 33 miles long, plus a criterium the following day, as I’ve had training rides in excess of 70 miles beforehand. The problem was that ever since my injury, I had never worked out for more than two days in a row in order to make sure I took frequent rest days. This race however, would require me to have a workout four days in succession – a warm up day, two race days, and a recovery day.

We arrived at the CPE parking lot the morning of the race. As we waited for the rest of the team, we saw the Texas 4000 team preparing for a training ride. These are the folk that go on a charity ride from Austin to Alaska in order to raise money for cancer research.

When the rest of the team arrived, we loaded up the trailer with our bikes. Most of the team purchased state-of-the art Gary Fisher Cronus bicycles, which we acquired through a deal from one of our sponsors, Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop. However, several members decided to use their old bikes for the course since it would be on dirt roads, and they didn’t want to ruin their new frames in the event of a crash. Since I didn’t buy a Gary Fisher, I just opted for a steel Fuji Marseille equipped with puncture resistant Gatorskin Tires.

After loading up the bikes, I decided to ride with Ken and Jacob and we headed out to College Station for a 2-hour drive. When we arrived, I met my parents as we prepared for the race. My dad took the courtesy to take some photographs of the race, which can be found here.

When they called up my group, Men’s D, me, Marc, Robbie, and a guy named Steve lined up. It was the first race for all of us, and we were all excited and nervous. There was a problem with one of the race vehicles so our start time was delayed for about thirty minutes, but shortly afterward the race set off. After the neutralized zone, the pace picked up quickly and we immediately hit a difficult section, colloquially known as the “rock garden.” This was pretty much two sections of 10m long gravel pits with rocks the size of your fist. The first section came up so suddenly that I didn’t have time to decide what path to take as there were several riders in front and at both sides of me. Thus, I hit the rock garden at the worst possible spot, the middle, and my bike fishtailed so violently that I was almost thrown off my bike. Luckily, I regained control and headed towards a sandy path that continued for about a mile.

The sand was treacherous. Everyone was swerving to the left and right, and I saw a guy from UNT fall when he took a left turn too sharply. When I went through the same left turn, my bike slowed down so much that I thought my bike would stop and I would fall. However, I powered my way through, but by the time I got to the packed dirt section I realized that I had gone off the back of the pack. I frantically picked up the pace and luckily I saw Robbie up ahead, and I sat on his wheel and let him tow me for a few hundred meters. Then, I saw an A&M guy furiously chasing back, so I got on his wheel and after riding three miles at full-blast, we finally caught back on to the main pack, which contained most of the A&M riders.

As I eased up to catch my breath, Robbie caught back on, and along with a few other riders, attacked the bunch as they tried to bridge to the leading trio. I decided to let Robbie go so I could rest while the group I was in did the work to catch his group. Then Marc attacked, and I ended up in a paceline with about four other A&M riders, a guy from TCU, another from UH, and another guy from an unknown school. As the other riders in my group did the work to catch up to Marc and Robbie, I had the luxury of doing no pacework as I had teammates in the front. However, it looked like Marc was getting tired so we decided to catch him after the twelfth mile. I was hoping that he would stay with us, but once we hit the rock pit for the second time, we lost him as he went off the back.

One lap down, two to go…The second lap was probably the easiest of the three, and we spent most of it at a moderate pace as we spent much of our energy navigating the rocks and dirt roads. However, the difficulty of the course took its toll on the people in my group, and we were soon reduced to four riders – me, two A&M riders, and the unknown. The unknown rider attacked us after the 18th mile, and we let him go because we had a feeling that he wouldn’t be able to keep up his pace for long. He was only able to get about 200 meters ahead of us, and we maintained that gap until he got tired and we caught him at about the 25th mile. He hung on for a little longer but we dropped him after he got tired.

On the third lap, it was just the three of us: me and the two A&M guys. After the sand trap, we lost one of the A&M guys, and the two of us found ourselves in no-man’s land. Fortunately, we bridged back up to Robbie’s group and we found ourselves some allies for the rest of the course. The final group contained me and Robbie, the A&M guy, a Baylor guy, an SMU guy, and quite possibly a few other riders that escaped my attention. Since we only had about 3 miles to go at this point, it became clear to us that we probably wouldn’t catch the leading trio, as it was possible that they may have already finished. Thus, it became a race for fourth, and we got ourselves into a cat-and-mouse situation where we were waiting for someone to make a move. Robbie and I had the advantage because we were teammates. Thus, when we hit the final climb of the race at 1km to go, Robbie told me to get ready. When it was his turn to lead the paceline, he accelerated, and I followed on his wheel. Then, when he let up, he told me to go as fast as I could. Thus, I charged out of our group and opened up a gap, with the rest of the riders furiously chasing. I went into the red-zone as it was the hardest uphill effort that I had ever put in. However, as I approached the line, the TCU guy nipped me in the sprint, and I had to settle for fifth, with Robbie getting 6th.

The TCU guy eventually came around…Credit goes to Kevin Tokarski @ cyclepics.net

After the finish, we got off our bikes to get water and stretch our sore legs, and sat down to wait for Marc. After a few minutes, Marc arrived and we celebrated the completion of our first road race. Overall, I felt satisfied with my performance in my first race, though it would have been better had we not let the leading trio get away.

After the race: me, Marc, and Robbie.

Posted in: Logs

#10 Cycling

20 September, 2009 6:06 PM / 1 Comment /

Hey,

Last week I decided to start riding my bicycle on the weekends for fun. I did a lot of riding when I was in high school, but I stopped in college because I wanted to devote more time to orchestra. Since I can’t do that anymore, I’m going back to cycling to give me something to do to get away from my studies. I can’t go all out because of my ankle injury from running. Cycling doesn’t bother it too much, but it still puts enough stress on it such that I still need to take it easy while it heals.

12.September.2009

18.9 Miles

This was my first time out, so I spent about half my time meandering around campus, and then I did a little exploring and went west on RR 2222 for a few miles, and then decided to go back.

20.September.2009

25.6 Miles

I went directly to RR 2222 this time, and I really like the road because of its bends and inclines. It’s a mountainous highway, so sometimes the cars drive really fast, and I got a few honks today which may or may not be a bad thing. I’m not really sure whether the drivers are trying to warn me that they’re coming around the bend, or if they simply want me to get out of the way. Anyways, the drivers here seem a little more cautious than the drivers in Houston, and they don’t go as fast, which is a good thing. Overall, I think Austin is a pretty bike friendly place. I was pretty sure of where I was going since I had studied a map ahead of time, but I wasn’t sure if I could make it back the way I came because it was all uphill. So I kept going until I came across another cyclist who happened to be a professor at my school. She gave me an alternate route so I went eastward down Spicewood Springs. There was a really steep hill and I almost made it up, but I had to give up about 20 ft. from the top! I went off of the road panting and I had to rest for about 20 minutes until I could get back on. I took an easy pace back on Shoal Creek until I reached the campus area. Since I had arrived earlier than expected, I just meandered around west and north campus until I hit 25 miles, then headed back home.

25.September.2009

35.1 Miles

Today I rode the Dam Loop! There’s an article in the Austin-American Statesman right here: http://www.statesman.com/search/content/health/fitcity/05/053004.html

The first section consisted of rolling hills that were very difficult. The rest of the ride however, wasn’t as hard. I did run out of liquid and I forgot to bring food along the way so I pretty much hit the wall after 25 miles. After a 10 minute break, I took it easy the rest of the way home. I was pretty surprised that with all the hills, my speed (15 mph) was faster than that of last time, even with the added distance. I don’t want to push myself too hard, so I’ll probably keep the same milage for another month or so, and if I feel good I’ll increase it later.

03.October.2009

45 Miles

I did the dam loop again today, but the only reason why I increased my mileage was that I missed a turn off of 620 and didn’t realize I had been going in the wrong direction until I was in a different city. So I had to turn around which added about 10 miles to my ride. The good thing is, I know that I can do at least 45 miles. I’m really tired though, so I’m not sure if I’ll do that much next weekend.

10.October.2009

35.7 Miles

After a month of increases, I decided to take it easy today and I did the Dam Loop again at a moderate pace. I also brought a friend along to pace me. So, next time I’ll try to do the hills on Mesa Dr. for some extra mileage.

17.October.2009

50.5 Miles

I probably should have thought twice before making such a drastic increase in mileage, but anyways, I did the Dam Loop again, except I left from my apartment instead of from the park next to the loop. The hills on Mesa Dr. are TOUGH. I was able to make it up on the way there because my legs were fresh…it’s definitely a few kilometers of straight climbing. On the way back I was so tired I had to stop and rest a while before continuing. Next time, I aim not to do that so much.

24.October.2009

61.5 Miles

This is defnitely the furthest I’ve gone alone (longest ride with other people was 100 mi.). I’m thinking about changing how I rate my performance by using time instead of distance. Anyways, the best way to rate performance is to use an abundance of information, especially power output and heart rate, but those stats require some expensive equipment! Anyways next week is gonna be a killer 70 miles! After that, I’ll ease up and start the easy phase of the next periodization cycle.

30.October.2009

70.0 Miles

This ride took a lot longer than I anticipated, and it started to get dark so it was pretty scary on the way back. Nevertheless, this is a personal best with respect to solo distance, and I also made a speed record as well (51.4 mph).

7.November.2009

45.6 Miles

I tried to take it easy this time so  I went exploring out east. However, the hills out there were almost as hard as the ones out west! They weren’t as long or steep, but there were a lot more of them making for an equally demanding ride.

Posted in: Cycling