TEVA Mountain Games

This past Friday, a couple of friends and myself flocked to Vail, CO for the TEVA Mountain Games. We setup camp in the White River National Forest, and then headed to town for pre ride, the jump jam, and to just hang out before our cross country race the following morning. 

Start time on Saturday wasn't till 11:45. We headed out from our campsite and rode to the start line. Looking around in the pro field, this was the most firepower in one field I have ever done. Names like JHK, Grotts, Finsterwald, Mitch Hoke, Jay Henry, and Colin Cares toed the line. I was a little nervous, but got over it pretty quick once the gun went off. The course consisted of a 7 mile loop with a steep 30 minute climb, and then a slow flowy descent (typical ski resort race). I didn't want to go out super hard, because we had to do 3 laps. A lot of people passed me the first lap, but there was a lot of double track so I wasn't worried about it. First and second lap were pretty smooth, nothing really was going on, I just rode in about a group of five guys to keep the pace up. 

Coming into the last lap, there was a really off camber turn that I got a good sized gap on. I decided to attack. I was a little worried because I would have to suffer through a full 30 minute climb before I could ease up at all. I put a lot of Women SS racers in between the group of five guys behind me right before the descent, so I was pretty content with my efforts. Coming into the last climb (about 30 seconds worth) I looked back just to make sure, and saw about seven guys in a train charging hard. I had to give 'er as hard as I could, but held them off till the finish line. I ended up 28th out of 45 finishers, not great. 

I've come to realize though that this is how it's going to be for the first couple years as a pro mountain biker. I had a good race, but everyone in the field is so strong, that it will take me a couple of years to get to that kind of level of racing. Clint also raced, and he did the expert field and placed 28th of 65 finishers! Things are looking good for the Pro XCT in Colorado Springs (June 16-17), and especially U23 Nationals. Next up Mountain States Cup #2 in Angel Fire! 

Mountain States Cup #1

This past weekend was the Mountain States cup #1 in Salida. I've never done any "series" races outside of collegiate in Colorado, so I didn't really know what to expect with field size, competition, course terrain, etc. This was also my first pro race. Clint and myself decided only to race the XC on Sunday, so we headed down with a couple of friends on Saturday morning so we could get a pre ride lap in. The Pro/Cat 1 course was a little different than what I'm used to. It started with a 30 second fire road climb, then into about a ten minute ROAD climb straight into single track. The single track was pretty long, and was followed by another 10 minute dirt climb that was very steep and loose. After that we descended on some SUPER gnarly drops, that I would run during the race. I was really contemplating what tires to run for this race, because it had some pretty jagged rocks and I was reluctant to run my Maxxis Ikons, because the possibility of a flat. I ended up going with the Ikons, and they worked fantastic! Really happy with the way they corner and roll.

The gun for my race went off at 11 am Sunday morning. The pro field was about 35 guys. It started out pretty mellow, until about the last 2 minutes of the road climb before the singletrack. I held my position best I could into the single track, and was in about the top 15. Once the really steep fire road climb came, I was getting passed. I like to think it was the higher elevation, because I'm usually alright at climbing, but I just couldn't hang on with the 2-3 guys behind me. After that I just tried to get my head together so I wouldn't kill myself on the descent. Come lap 2 I wanted to make sure I caught a drafting partner for the road climb. I pace lined with BMC development rider Jack Hinkens who dropped me a little bit right before the single track. At this point the race as pretty strung out and I just wanted to make sure I held my position. As I was trying to catch Jack in front of me, I heard his tire go pssssssssss. He didn't have any way to re inflate it, so I stopped quick to give him my Genuine Innovations Big Air (karma). After that I cruised into the finish, feeling like I was bringing up the back of the race. I ended up 19th of the 35 pros, 13 minutes off the winner Mitch Hoke. I'm fairly pleased with that result, but I think I can do better. Right now it's just lots of tune up races before the CO springs PRO XCT, Nationals, and the Missoula PRO XCT.

The kits are supposedly coming in real soon, so I'll have to post some pictures of those once they arrive.  Couldn't locate any pictures of me at the MSC #1, so I'll leave with a New Belgium Short Track photo.

Clint took second in the Cat 2 19-29 race! 

Pre Mountain season update

It's been a while since I updated this with some race information! I know all of you sit by your computer all day and click the refresh button awaiting a fruitful new post, but no worries, the time has come. Mountain bike season is approaching quickly. The first WORS race for the Wisconsin folks is coming up on May 6th. As for myself, and a couple of other team members here in Fort Collins, Colorado, collegiate road racing is taking up the majority of training time in preparation for collegiate road nationals, and of course mountain bike season. Mountain bike races for this summer that the team will be appearing at include US Nationals (Ketchum, ID), some Mountain States Cups, Rocky Mountain Endurance Series, Forty in the Fort, Collegiate MTB in the fall, and many others that will find themselves on the schedule. Our new kits are supposed to be delivered May 1st via declare, and I couldn't be more excited to see how they turn out. As for now, here's some pictures to keep you motivated to check our blog throughout the season!

Clint ripping it in the Stazio Crit earlier this collegiate season.

Zach Bodhane (Bodice) coming in hot at the Air Force Academy Collegiate Crit this weekend. He plans to do a lot of mountain racing this summer, and is in pursuit of his pro upgrade. (Photo Cred Dean Warren)

Me failing to get a draft off a mines rider this past weekend at Air Force. Notice the Moots full campy! (Kents old road bike) (Photo Cred Dean Warren)

Todd and Cameron gettin' it done with a night ride!

Cameron training to get in 100 Miles in at the Greenbush Trails in Wisconsin

Review: Pacenti TL28 Rims (Building)

In order to attract more readers to our team blog, I'm going to be reviewing various bike related products that I feel people would enjoy. I'm going to start off by reviewing the new Pacenti TL28 29er rims. Let me start off by saying that Kirk Pacenti is the man. Super nice guy, and really easy to work with. Anyway, this review will be more about the building process and features. I will do an actual ride review once the snow melts here in Fort Collins. I turned to these rims because I was looking for a training wheel set for the season. I decided instead of building another wheel set, I was going to look for a rim that could be used for training and racing successfully. I wanted something wider, to get the benefits of a wide rim (see pic below).

These rims are 28mm wide, and have an inner bead width of 23mm. Comparatively to my Stan's ZTR Crests which were 24mm wide with a 21mm inner width (see picture below). Also the TL28's are eyeletted, which allows you to run higher tensions, and makes for a stronger wheel. Kirk recommends 100-110 Kgf. Below is a diagram of the rim profile. These rims come in at a average weight of 450 grams a piece, but the rims Kirk sent me were lighter than this (luck of the draw).

On the left is the TL28 rim, and on the right is my old ZTR Crest rim. The difference is obvious.

I built these rims up with CX-Sapim ray spokes (best strength to weight ratio), 14mm aluminum sapim nipples, and Chris King Iso Disc Hubs. I'd say my wheel building experience is moderate, as I have built somewhere around 20-30 wheel sets before. These rims built up very well, and I had little problems getting them tensioned, true, and round. After building them up, I used 25mm Stan's tape to make them tubeless compatible. I threw on my Maxxis ardents (2.4 front, 2.25 UST rear) and pumped them up to 30 psi a piece. The rear one went up with a floor pump, but I had to use a compressor for the front one. They sealed up pretty good, but not quite as good as my old ZTR crests. I won't see how this tubeless system really works though until I get out on the trail.

If any of you read Velonews, Nick Legan had a great explanation to why wider rims are better in the 2011 buyer's guide. In short, wider rims offer more volume which makes for a cushier ride, straighter sidewalls, which provides better cornering and less chance of you denting your rim, and a wider contact patch. The contact patch is actually shorter, but there is less rolling resistance because there's less of the tire length wise on the trail (see diagram).

Here's a snapshot of them all built up. As soon as I hit the trails I will do an actual ride review. If you liked this review bookmark our blog so that you can see other reviews I plan on doing, and keep up to date on Team Eriksen's 2012 race season!

Tucson Trip

Early January usually marks my annual trip to Tucson, AZ with the Colorado State Cycling Team. After spending sometime back home with the family, I headed back to the Colorado on the 7th. We hauled down to Tucson at 4 am in the morning and got there around 9, and unloaded the 20+ bikes out of the trailer. The week was mainly going to be comprised of mountain biking, because I can do road biking in Fort Collins any time. So The first day was to venture some of the stuff close around of the house such as gates pass, brown mountain, starr pass, etc. Besides the occasional pricker in the leg and shoe it was a success.

Eriksen guys Matt Fox and Zach Bodhane enjoying the temperatures and sun on gates pass. Also gates pass isn't the easiest trail ever, if you're not about to crash you're not going fast enough. A lot of crashes caught on film, unfortunately not on a helmet cam that I own though.

On Tuesday we decided to climb up the Mount Lemmon trail called "la milagrosa." A lot of hike a bike was involved, but it was fun to try and climb some of the gnar. Our legs looked like mince meat because of the cacti grabbing and pulling our skin back. The descent was pretty long, somewhere in the range of an hour and a half filled with tons of drops and loose rocks, the loose rocks seemed to be to much for Fox as he merely missed a cactus.

The day was also so long we found ourselves descending in the dark. Picture of new Eriksen member Clint and Fox all smiles towards the end.

The last day we did something called the Lemmon drop in reverse. Basically stringing together certain trails on Mount Lemmon. We made it near the top but got turned around by snow. The video below is a of us at the top, but the cell phone doesn't do any justice for the views. Also, sorry about the videos not being rotated the right way, but apparently you need to pay for software to do that now.

Also a video of "The shoots." These are very eroded fast trails that have really banked turns and a few drops, they are just off the 50 year old trail.

As of now in regards to Team Eriksen, all the sponsors are setup and you can check them out in the sidebar. Kits are on order and should be here in 10-12 weeks. Training is just starting up again as late January approaches, and Team Eriksen is off to a good start. Hope you saw the kit, if not check out the twitter feed in the sidebar as it is top notch, thanks to Chris Hall's graphic design skills.

Moab Trip

Over this past thanksgiving break, a few of us took a pilgrimage to Moab. Of the five I was the only one who has never been there. We headed out late Saturday morning, and loaded up the subaru outback to the brim. Going through Glenwood Springs, Matt Fox joins the party. We squeeze one more roof rack on, and continue on.

We rolled into town later, got groceries, and checked in at the hostel. First morning after a big batch of pancakes, we headed to the bottom of the porcupine trail head (by the river). We continued to climb all the way up, until we hit so much snow that we had to turn around (made it around four and a half hours up).

We turned around and continued down the epic decent of rocks, drops, and fun. Here's a video of Brady, Fox, and Clint.

Monday we woke up again with the standard pancake ritual. We headed to poison spider trail, and rode up to the top of the "portal trail". This is definitely by far one of the craziest trails I've ever done. The start of the trail has a sign that says "caution, 3 bicyclists have died on this trail." So we rode a little bit of it, but decided to hike the rest because it was really sketchy. Here's a video to show you why. The bottom part of the trail isn't as bad, just lots of gnarly drops and rocks.

After grabbing a quick bit to eat, we headed to the famous slick rock trail. This trail is different than anything I have ever done. It's literally all slick rock, and you follow a white dashed line so you don't get lost. There's lots of up and down on this trail, often you can't decide what gear will work. We were running low on daylight, so we had to pick up the pace. We ended up finishing just in time to enjoy a big spaghetti dinner at the hostel.

We left Moab early Tuesday Morning. No trip is complete with a ride in Fruita on the way back, though. Exhausted, we rode around four hours to complete our epic trip. Overall the trip was really awesome, and surprisingly had very few mechanicals between the five of us (one flat and one broken chain). I will definitely be going back there again.

2011 Season Coming to a Close

The season is coming to a close, and Team Eriksen is hoping to finish strong this weekend for the last race of the season (sheboygan)! I just wanted to give thanks to all of our awesome sponsors. Eriksen for their great frames that propelled across the finish line, Ergon for keeping our hands comfy all season, Genuine Innovations in the case of a flat during a race, Honey stinger for the race fuel all season, and Mt. Borah for the awesome kits. We hope for your continued support for the 2012 season. Also 2012 sponsor hopefuls for the team include maxxis and chris king. Below is some highlighted results from everybody. Good work boys, and here's to a great 2012 season!

Matt Fox

Subaru Cup Pro XCT Cat 1 19-29----------------------9^th overall

Mountain states cup #8 snowmass cat 1 19-29------1^st age, 1^st overall

Look out for him this year!

Greg Krieger (myself)

2011 Mountain bike nationals Cat 1 19-23---------------2^nd place Cross Country

2011 Mountain bike nationals Cat 1 19-29 Super D----1^st place national champion!

2011 Mountain bike nationals Cat 1 19-29 Short Track-----4^th place

Subaru Cup Pro XCT Cat 1 19-29---------------------------------7^th overall

12 hours of northern kettles duo--------------------------------1^st place

Cameron Schave

WORS #11 Bear Paw Rock n’ Roll cat 1 17-18----- 3^rd place

12 hours of northern kettles duo----------------------1^st place

Zach Bodhane

Leadville Gold Belt buckle winner, under 9 Hours!

Joel Finkeldei

Subaru Cup Pro XCT XC cat 2 25-29----4^th place

Most improved Rider for sure! Up and rising Cat 1 racer for the team.

Matt Dale

Crystal Lake Classic WORS #2 Cat 2 40-44-------3^rd place

Subaru Cup Pro XCT Cat 2 40-44 XC-------------------7^th place

WORS #11 Bear Paw Rock n’ Roll cat 2 40-44------5^th place

Dakota Dale

Crystal Lake classic WORS #2 Cat 2 19-24----------- 1^st place

Subaru Cup Pro XCT Cat 2 19-24-------------------------4^th place

Chippewa Valley Firecracker WORS #5 Cat 2 19-24-----2^nd place

WORS #11 Bear Paw Rock n’ Roll cat 2 19-24----------2^nd place

Chris Harrison

Crystal Lake classic WORS #2 Cat 2 19-24-------4^th place

Alterra Coffee Bean Classic WORS #6 Cat 2 19-24---3^rd place

Todd Nutter

WORS #9 Suamico Cat 2 39 under Clyd-------4^th

New members include category 1 racer Matt Millin, and Category 2 racer Clint Mitchell. They are both looking forward to representing Team Eriksen and all of our great sponsors.