The skis have been put away until next December. The river is about to hit 1,000 cubit feet per second and open to rafting. The trails in town are dry and open for business. The Tuesday Night Worlds weekly fast road ride has cranked back up. The temps are flirting with 70 degrees. The sun doesn’t set until 7:30 now. Spring is here, and I’ve been busy knocking off some rust.

I’ve gone for a ride or nice hike/run everyday for the past two weeks. I had acquired a little bit of belly fat from the winter and going out to pint night too much, but I have leaned back out quickly thanks to all of this riding and giving up alcohol, going out eat, and all processed foods for lent.

At first I was riding on the road since most of the trails were still too muddy. But gradually, the snow melted and the runoff subsided on the Dalla trail system and I broke out the fat tires and started going there. It had been a good 4 1/2 months since I laid rubber on a trail. The legs were weak, and my handling was timid. I was left wondering how in the world I would get ready for a 230 mile ride across Colorado and into Utah in just 3 months. I had a lot of rust to knock off.

This week I decided to jumpstart the racing legs by hopping in the Tuesday Night Worlds. Austin is famous for the Tuesday nighter. We have our own little version here, and it is arguably better. For one thing, you never who might show up. Ned, Todd Wells, Sarah Tescher, Tad Elliot, Payson, Rowan, or who knows. Still, even the riders you don’t know will kick your ass. For another, we have climbs. Real climbs. And at 6500-8500 feet. The route also changes every week. All the routes roll out from town, so you don’t have to ride 13 miles just to get to the course, or worse yet, ride 13 miles back home after being obliterated. And lastly, much better weather. Right now temps are in the 50’s/60’s ride time. By summer, it would pretty dang hot if we hit 91. None of that 105+ crap down in Texas. but I digress.

The 24lb steel 1986 Trek Elance 440 and I showed up for the B ride. The A group had a cooler route, but I knew there was no way in hell I could keep up with those guys in my condition on that dinosaur of a bike.  It didn’t take long for the hotheads to push a ridiculous pace and split the group up. I was one of the many spit off the back. The very back, at that. The split occurred at the base of the first big climb, and luckily, we regrouped at the top. I was seriously winded and a bit demoralized, but pushed on. Before long we hit the 2nd big climb and I noticed people starting to tire. We came back down and hit the rolling county road back into town. The peloton was getting really tired at this point. I felt like I was getting faster, and then I had my epiphany.

I am a second half racer. When others start to tire and cave in is when I typically start to do my best. I thought back to Rocky Hill last fall. I went against my normal way of operation, and paid the price. Then I thought back to all but a few of my big wins. I had always started slow and near last and gradually clawed my way to victory. Flash forward to this night’s ride. People were obviously hurting and not wanting to do any work. I wanted to go faster though, so I found my way to front and started to do some pulls-long and hard. It was awesome. Suddenly my doubt was beginning to crumble.

The muscles are getting stronger, the trail skills have returned, the tan lines are coming back, and I am loving it all. There is still a long way to go before June 27,  but I feel good about the start. I’m thinking of adding a second race to the year to use as a training race for this San Juan ride. I still haven’t secured full time work, so whether or not I enter will be based upon funding in the next few months. The bright side is that the local economy is picking up with the warmer weather coming to town so hopefully I can find something.

That is the update for now. Hope everybody is enjoying the awesome spring weather, wherever you might be.

Daylight savings took place the other day. The sun doesn’t set until about 7:30 now. Not only that, but we’re getting a little more daylight every day. The air is starting to warm up. The snow has all but melted in town. In the outskirts and higher up, it’s getting soft and starting a trickle into the seasonal creeks. I can tell that the Animas river is starting to rise just a little. There is a hint of green in some of the vegetation that was brown all winter long. Some birds that went south for warmer weather are starting to come back. Spring isn’t quite here, but it sure is in the air.

Today was actually my last day to work up at the resort, and hence probably my last day of skiing for the season. Last Friday I went up to La Plata Canyon with a friend and the dogs. We rode our mountain bikes on the snow covered road for about an hour and a half. It was the first real bike ride of any kind this year.

Sunday, I broke out the road bike and went for a two hour ride, maybe about 30 miles and 2,000 ft of climbing. My first road ride of the year-and it was amazing.

Monday I went up to Dalla park, praying that the trail would be dry enough to get in some good trail riding. It was, but just barely. Another week of this 60 degree weather and it should be in prime shape.

It became clear pretty quickly that my skills were a bit rusty, and 4 months off the bike hasn’t completely destroyed my riding fitness, but has definitely put a dent in it. The road to success in the San Juan Hut race this summer is going to be long and difficult. I have a little over 3 months to prepare. I wish I had more like 4 or 5, but there isn’t too much I can do about snow covering the trails around here, other than do lots of road riding in miserable conditions, which is what the pros do, but that ain’t exactly my cup of tea. Instead, I will attempt to play catch up and work just hard enough to get the results I want. I don’t want to work too hard for fear of injury or burnout. The cool thing is that this will be my first spring living in a mountain town. I moved here in the summer, enjoyed the fall, survived my first real winter, and now I’m looking forward to my favorite season of the year-spring. I am now fully acclimated to the climate and elevation so riding through the mountains should be much more enjoyable than when I first moved here.

Deciding to do the race this summer under the “epic” category, or self supported and attempting to complete the 230 mile course in less than 48 hours has got me really intrigued with the concept of “bikepacking”. This is simply where you rig your bike to carry enough gear to ride out into the wilderness for a few days and camp along the way. This requires a sturdy, comfortable rig, nice lightweight gear, and nice bags to carry all that gear. It’s also a practice in figuring out how you can do more with less since you obviously don’t want to be carrying any unnecessary weight up thousands of vertical feet. It will be a long time before I acquire all the gear to be a pro bikepacker (mainly because this stuff is expensive and I’m still very broke), but, I should have enough stuff already laying around where I can do some short 1 or  2 night trips close to town. I plan on doing these mini trips 2 or 3 times a month for supplemental training, but also to get out and enjoy some kick ass Colorado spring camping.

So that’s all the new news thus far. March 16 marks the one year anniversary of the accident that left me with a severely dislocated shoulder. To this day my shoulder is not right and gives me problems. A couple of hard falls while skiing this year have not helped at all. I have just sort of learned to deal with it. I’m not sure how it will respond to training again. Might not like it all, but on the other hand it might strengthen it. We’ll see. Thanks for checking into the man cave. Enjoy the spring weather, wherever you might be, and be safe out there.

-Caveman

March 1, 2012

Today wasn’t really anything out of the ordinary. I missed the shuttle to work up at the resort and had to drive instead. I hate driving up there, especially with as much snow as we’ve been getting this week, but it would later prove to be in my favor. I got to work and didn’t have a snowshoe tour scheduled, but a group of us decided to go up anyways to pack the trail since the mountain had received 24”+ of snow in the last few days. Busting drifts up at 10,800 ft was a lot of fun, but a little tiring. After that I had to shovel some snow, but was free to ski the rest of the day and look for guests on the slopes to assist. It was snowing hard, and was windy and cold, so not too surprisingly, there weren’t many people out skiing. I wrapped up my runs around 3:15 and checked in to finish up my shift, but it was so slow they let us go early, so instead of waiting until 5:15 to catch the shuttle, I had a truck to take me back. I also gave a fellow tour guide a lift back to town, and wouldn’t you know, she is a fellow real estate investor so we had some good conversation on the ½ hour drive back.

Now comes the part that makes this day not so ordinary. Today, the court hearing happened in Austin to legally finalize the divorce. Ever since I learned that the hearing would be this day, it has been on my mind. Colleen and I have said our goodbyes and come to terms with the circumstances, but still, something like this stirs up emotion and brings a much needed sense of closure. I feel like I can move forward with new relationships and other aspects of my life. This is one of the small steps I mentioned back on New Years that I knew I had to take to move forward.

Even though I was tired from play and work, I felt like I needed to do something to commemorate the day. I decided to take Rocco on a nice hike up to Hogsback peak.

The hike started with a wicked snow storm blowing in from the west. The wind and snow concerned me a bit since I knew I would be on an exposed ridge for a while, but the storm died down and the sky orchestrated with the mountains and snow to provide the most stunning vistas I’ve yet to experience here in Durango while we made the steep ascent.

I couldn’t have asked for a more mystical sunset to contemplate the good times I shared with such an awesome person.

While I’m strongly committed to looking to the future, today, I feel compelled to look to the past. I just wanted Colleen and everyone else to know I have no ill feelings, no contempt, no negative anything towards the person that used to be my wife. I choose not to remember the bad times, but rather the times like this:

And one last thing before I hit the hay for some much needed rest this evening. This might not be our song anymore, but it was at one point. I’m always going to think of Cupcake and Caveman anytime I hear it. Take care, Cupcake.