Check out the story at the following link on BikePortland.org 

http://bikeportland.org/2007/08/30/time-to-get-ready-for-cyclocross-season/#more-4841 

On Friday night, the HealthNet boys put on a clinic at their sponsor’s race, taking the top 2 spots in front of a very enthusiastic crowd for the 2^nd year in a row at the HeathNet Twilight Criterium in Portland, OR. 

The race occurred on a tough 1k, L-shaped course surrounding the infamous park blocks nestled between the swanky Pearl and Portland’s China Town districts. Promoter Brad Ross designed it to showcase cycling in the best light possible locally and did not disappoint. Spectators were treated to music, a beer garden and a great 360 degree view of the racing. 

Every 50 seconds, the riders would blast down the 3 block long start/finish section into a series of tight corners which proved to be the undoing of the peloton early on and led to a series of no less than 5 crashes before the night was over. The early push by Ryan Trebon, Johnny Sundt, HealthNet and local strong teams CMG and Casa Bruno split the field to the decisive move of 20 in less than 5 laps. This initial hammering left the field in several splinter groups for the rest of the race. Riders dropped 1 by 1 while groups formed and fell apart leaving the main field lapped a full 3 times before the race concluded. 

The action happened so fast it was hard for the average spectator to tell what was going on in the race. After an attempt by several riders to get up the road including Seth Hosmer of CMG racing, Athens, GA prodigy and ex-U23 National Team member John Murphy of HealthNet punched the ticket that started what was to be the first lapping of the field before the race was even 20 min old. 

What was left of the original split of 20 soon followed and after others tried to leap away to no avail, Mr. Murphy, seemingly inspired by what surely was one of his best performances to date, found the legs to go again. Only this time, the field couldn’t follow and the young rider proceeded to stay away with the help of his team mates, Ollerenshaw, Pipp and O’ Bee to take the solo win ½ a lap ahead of the charging field. 

Several crashes took out many of the race favorites including Evan Elken who went down while looking cool as a cucumber and not even breathing hard. Crashes like this one plagued many riders and seemed to leave the final sprint a wide open crap shoot. Fellow HealthNet rider, Doug Ollerenshaw, who is not known as a prolific field sprinter led it out early and convincingly stole the 2^nd podium spot from what was left of the charging field, with BMC’s Chad Hartley taking 3^rd. This is certainly one of the biggest wins of John Murphy’s young career. John is no stranger to tough racing after a stint in Europe on the US National Team and racing the NRC calendar with HealthNet in 2006. However, with a performance like that, I would expect to see much more of Mr. Murphy in the near future. 

Check out the full results at the OBRA (Oregon Bicycle Racing Association) web site. 

Local boy Aaron Olson is sitting in 3rd overall in the Tour of Ireland. Congrats! 

Check it out and the stories on CyclingNews.com.

I just want to give a lot of props to all who raced last night. That course looked tough and so did the races. A lot of hard work was done by all, or at least it looked that way from the side lines. A special to Athens, GA prodigy and ex-U23 National team member, John Murphy from HealthNet for the race of his life and a solid solo win in the P1/2 race.  This 1/2 mile L-shaped course provided for tight racing and within 3 laps the front group of 20 had already been established and the field was completely shattered. John lapped the field solo after only 20 min into the race and the group soon followed. The remaining field was lapped a full 3 times before the end of the race. 

Check out a great story on what Phil Southerland and Team Type 1 from Atlanta, GA are up to on the Wall Street Journal site. A great read about good stuff going on in the sport which is a nice change of pace as of recent.   

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB118704059198796369.html

Written by Marianne Holt

Arrival:
We made the eight hour trip from Matthews, North Carolina to Seven Springs Resort in Champion, Pennsylvania on Independence Day. (“We” includes myself and Butch, my husband, training partner and mechanic.) About five miles outside of Seven Springs, we hooked up with our friends Chris and Lori Harkey, who, along with others from North Carolina, would be our condo-mates and cheering fans for the entire week.

Jeb scheduled an opener for me on Thursday to get me ready for Friday’s time trial. He had told me that my legs probably wouldn’t feel good on Thursday and he was right. I felt sluggish, I struggled to get my power in the ranges he prescribed and I was really beginning to worry about the time trial! I was concerned that I had ridden too much in the last week or two coming into these races and that I was still tired. I would find out soon.

Time Trial:
After two days of cool, rainy weather, the skies cleared and the sun came out on Friday morning as we headed to the time trial course. Butch had an early start so I was there in plenty of time to get ready for my 11:00 am start. During my warm-up, I remembered something Butch had told me about how “focused” I am before my races. Being focused probably sounds like a good thing and something that Jeb would be proud of. And maybe he would. But the truth of the compliment is that my focused state does not necessarily bring out the best in me. I basically think only of myself and my upcoming race and I can’t discuss anything unless it is related to me and my race.

After the first tempo effort of my warm-up, I was in my focused state, ignored everything going on around me and thought only of my upcoming my race. Finally it was time to head over to the start. It was very warm by now and I was so nervous, my mouth was parched. I had removed my bottle cage to gain every aerodynamic advantage I could, so I had no water to drink. I was so thirsty! As usual, I got to the start at least 5 minutes earlier than necessary. So I sat down on the pavement, waited in line for my start, and sized up the other women. They all looked very fit and had fast-looking bikes. One woman had her husband? boyfriend? coach? with her; he was giving her last-minute encouraging words and making sure she was ready. Where was Butch? Maybe if I hadn’t been so “focused”, he would have been here with me? Finally it was time to walk up the ramp to the start. This was only my third time trial of the season and I was nervous about the start. The holder was complaining that his hands were cramping. Oh no, is he going to drop me??

Finally I was off and remembered, “Don’t start out too hard, Don’t start out too hard, Don’t start out too hard”. I think this is first time I really listened to those words. I started out at a high tempo pace and worked up to threshold after about three minutes. The interesting thing about this course was the five turns. It sounded like a horrible course, but it really worked for me. Just as I was beginning to feel the lactic acid creep in, it was time to slow down and turn again. As I approached the third turn at the far end of the course, a U-turn in a single lane, I noticed several people standing there telling me to slow down. For the life of me, I could not see the turn. I finally saw it and hit my breaks. Oops, my rear tire is skidding. Oops, almost hit that cone. Whew, made the turn without crashing. That was scary! Now I know why they were telling me to slow down!

During the race I kept an eye on my power meter and I could tell that I was having a good race. My power readings were higher than other time trials I had done this year and I felt stronger and stronger throughout the race. I kept repeating the mantras that Jeb had helped me with and that I had practiced in the days and weeks before the race. As I approached the last 500 meters I could see the finish. I wasn’t feeling so strong by this time. The finish appeared to be slightly uphill but it felt like I was climbing a mountain. I could see the clock ticking away at the finish and knew that my time was going to be close to 30 minutes. I pushed as hard as I could, my quads screaming. I crossed the finish line in 30 minutes, 3 seconds. That seemed good to me but I had no idea how the other women were doing so I would have to wait and see. I mostly just wanted to find some cold water!

Butch was at the finish with a cold water bottle for me. As we rode along to cool down, he told me that the announcers predicted mine would be the winning time. I couldn’t believe it! We cooled down a little longer and finally rode over to check out the results. Oh my gosh, I can’t believe it. I WON! The biggest smile came over my face, just like the smile I had visualized in the mental exercises Jeb had coached me through. It was a very familiar feeling although it was totally new to me. I was so thrilled I couldn’t believe it. I honestly did not expect to win the time trial. When I called Jeb to tell him, his response was “I know you won”. I thought, how did HE know already? The truth is, he knew before I went up there that I was capable of winning the time trial. I can’t remember how many times he told me that. I guess I believe him now.  

Criterium:
The criterium was the next day, Saturday July 7th. It was very hot, but again, I was grateful for the clear, blue skies. I had checked out last year’s results and knew which racers I really needed to watch. The first and second place finishers from last year were here so I was especially watching them. As it turned out, “watching” was the race strategy of the entire field. It’s embarrassing now, but this was the slowest, most boring race I’ve ever done. The course was not technical, essentially flat and no one seemed willing to make it a race – including me. There were a few attacks, some of which I made, but the field was always right on them. In between the attacks, I think we rode about 12 - 15 mph. No one was willing to push the pace. It soon became obvious that this was going to come down to a field sprint. This was not the best scenario for me so I knew that I had to attack early in the last lap to try and get away before the sprint. I had picked my spot before the second turn and went for it. I made it through the turn with a small gap but the field was quickly on me. I moved over into third position and decided this was the next best option to getting away. At least I had a good position going into the final turn. Well, this was not such a good option since I am not a sprinter and the sprinters had been resting the entire race. I went from 3rd position to 6th by the time we crossed the finish line. In hindsight, there were many things that I could’ve, would’ve, and should’ve done differently. I wished I had, but I didn’t and this race was behind me so it was time to focus on Monday’s road race.

�

Recently I was fortunate enough to be asked to be one of the support staff of a 4-person, female relay team doing the Race Across Oregon. This was largely due to the fact that my wife joined their group when they needed a 4th person to complete the mission. I don’t think either of us had any idea what we were getting into and that’s a good thing, because had we known, we might have missed out on what turned out to be one of the most amazing experiences either of us have had to date.

The team included:

Riders (from R to L)
Kim Reuter
Colleen McClenahan
Sarah Tisdale
Deb Stewart

Directors
Jeff & Shari Tedder

Support Crew
Ken McClenahan
Wiley “Coyote”
Daniel Morgan
Derwyn Harris
Jeb Stewart

Masseuse
Ginger Matyas

For those not familiar with this event, it is a 535 mile race across the varying landscapes of western and central Oregon. It starts out in Portland and encircles Mt. Hood by winding through the arid landscapes of the central Oregon desert by way of many 10-30 mile climbs that cumulatively acquire over 40,000 vertical ft of climbing. OUCH!

And no, this isn’t done over the course of 3-7 days, it’s done straight through. Whether you’re an individual doing it solo or a 4 person relay team, the race is done right through the day and night on into the next without resting. It started at 7 am on Saturday morning and we finished at 12 noon the next day.

I have to say that this was one of the neatest things I have been a part of to date. The scenery alone was incredible as we traversed through some of the most beautiful spots in Oregon in the morning and evening hours to boot. The team work, effort and great attitudes by the ladies and of the support staff were inspiring to say the least. Some seriously laughswere had by all. When you stay up all night, all sorts of “odd” and hilarious things happen. We’ll just leave it at that to protect the innocent and the embarrassed!

The girls rode hard from the gun right through until the end taking 30 min pulls until the last 7 miles uphill where the rotations came quicker in an effort to keep the morale up and in an attempt to break 29 hours (our goal was 30 hours and they beat the 4-person female team record by 6 hours). It was emotional to see them finish at the top of Timber line all together as one unit.

For another story on this event, check out the press on www.veloreview.com/ at the following link.
http://www.veloreview.com/obra3/2007/07/race-across-oregon.html/

Be sure to check out all of the photos from the race at the following links as well. Enjoy!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/derwyn/sets/72157600990182302/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/42615191@N00/sets/72157601001292134/

http://www.flickr.com/gp/88304480@N00/1B80S1

We’d like to thank Therapeutic Associates of Portland and Hammer Nutrition for their sponsorship of this event and our team! We couldn’t have done it without you, and certainly not as quickly!

And last but not least, we’d like to thank George Thomas and Terry Gooch for putting on such a well run, positive and fun event. It’s no small under taking and we appreciate your efforts and those of your team as well. Check out their site for more info and to find out about the other events they host at http://www.raceacrossoregon.com/.

-JS

We were fortunate enough to do an interview with local writer and bike racer Stephanie Chase from BikePortland.org. 

Stephanie interviewed Adnan Kadir of the Peaks Coaching Group and I about the impetus of and experience with the clinic series so far. She also came along and participated on the Time Trialing clinic last night.

Stephanie will be attending the final clinic next week where we will be putting every thing we’ve learned in the series to practice in mock races. A good time is sure to be had by all.  

Check out the link below for her first article and be sure to check back at BikePortland.org for her follow up. Enjoy!

http://bikeportland.org/2007/07/30/women%e2%80%99s-cycling-clinics-a-popular-draw/