I had two events I wanted to do, one which was a huge stretch (Iron Mountain 100k, didnt realize it was 3 hours away, on a Sunday) but the other one was a 3/6 hour race in Bur Mil, Closer to Greensboro.

The plan for this 3/6 hour race was to do the 3 hour race, then head to my folks to enjoy some Fathers Day festivities and the beach. The race starts at 10am (weird for a 3 or 6 hour lap race) which means I don’t have to wake up too early. It’s an hour and forty five minutes away but the drive goes by quick. Roll up, hit the bathroom, and go to register. I decided to do the 3 hour race because it would be more in my wheel house and the mental game of a 6 hour lap race is meh. Give the people my name and they say:

“You know the 3 hour race doesn’t start until 1pm, right?”

Ummm, no. This isn’t going to work. They offer me to race the 6 hour race, but I don’t have enough food or water. The other option is to wait for 1pm to do a 3 hour race, but this ruins my whole plan of driving the 3 hours to Wilmington to hang with my folks. Talk about a pickle. I check the website and emails and nothing mentions anything that the 3 hour race starts at 1pm. I find the promoter and explain my scenario and tell him theres nothing about the start times. Mandi said the guy was just like me in terms of tone and problem solving. In the end he was able to transfer my registration to the 3 hour race I wanted to do in July. But still, was all tuned up for this race, and nothing. Fart noise.

It was super deflating. I did enjoy the weekend, jumping in the beach, spending time with my folks and all that. It was another weekend of no riding and completely off my groove in terms of training/riding. It was easy to question and brings me back to my last post, WTF am I doing? It’s just not the same. It’s hard to say if I miss the NJ scene, or I miss the crews and relationships I formed when racing/training, but it’s missing. It’s making the desire to train go out the window. The emptiness on the calendar makes me wonder.

Spoke with a couple of my peers and I came to the realization that maybe training for mountain bike racing in these parts is, meh. I always felt that if I wasn’t training or riding, I wasn’t making gainz. Maybe that is true. What am I gaining? I looked at the last weeks Charlotte Weds race and 2 people did the Pro/19-39 race. TWO!? After this 3 hour debacle, I hit the calendar and looked for events in the area and found a XC race that was more of a NJ style, 27 mile Cat 1 XC race. Still raced with the pros, but figured I would give it a go. It was 2 hours away.

2 hours of driving,
2:15-2:30 of racing, and 2 hours back.

I could not find a reason to do this. I couldn’t get motivated for it.

I know it is June and maybe it’s just the mid-season summer blues. I always remember that the middle of the season is the easiest time to say “this season sucks, bring on the next season” but maybe it is that time. Maybe being able to be more competitive in cross is going to make training easier. Then again (let’s see if @Norm reads this date), November 7th is going to come up fast. M is so small, I can’t imagine her going all the way to the 7th. We do not want a Halloween baby though. Cross starts in beginning/middle of October. Am I really going to invest tons of time in the next coming months to be razor sharp for 4 weekends of cross? Is racing in November/December even going to be realistic? Am I personally going to want to leave the house at 9am and leave Mandi home by herself for half the day? @Norm has always said mid week cross training is all the same anyway. Off, Recovery, Cross Practice, Openers, Race, repeat. Maybe I can just wing it? The other perk is that I have not gotten fatter, I’m still at my 155 base line.

The house is good, we ordered a table for our kitchen, I have the TV on the wall, a rug, did some mulch this weekend. That pine straw shit is gross. Started it at 8pm and finished around 9:30, which was kind of funny. Get all yo shit done when the sun is gone. Still worried I will have a dust bowl in the backyard.

What will be really interesting is I will be up for weekends in July (Mandi going to a wedding shower, same weekend as MC H2H race), August (M’s Baby Shower, French Creek Weekend) and September (Wedding, weekend of Nittany)

Doing Mountain Creek is realistic while the French Creek would probably be impossible, but would be awesome to make Nittany happen.

I even went back in my phone and I do not have anything else too exciting to share. Minus that cool truck we found on a road ride. but I won’t repost it. Okay I will because it was cool.

Mandi says this looks more like me as a baby.

Motivation Levels Low

Motivation has been lacking down here for me. I mean sure, moving into a new house and all the drama that comes along with that adds up, but I don’t think that is the main source of “WTF am I doing”. Last weekend was a great way to reset the body with heading down to Wilmington for my sisters wedding; 3 days of being off the bike and forgetting that lifestyle really helped. Being out of rhythm and sleeping/traveling so much was terrible, but 10 days later, we are back in the groove.

Me and me lady mid-wedding.

This week I have felt good. The new roads from the crib are awesome, reminds me of all the foothills of Lambertville/Sourlands area…. But no traffic, no pot holes and awesome views. No climb is more than 1-2 minutes, which is taking some getting used to.

I think part of the motivation is looking at my calendar and it looks rather short. 2 months left of “the season” and I have 3 things lined up. 2 are 3 or 6 hour lap races and 1 is the Mount Mitchell one, which I’m looking forward to. Or maybe this amount of events is just normal? I’m trying to stay focused and keep my nose to the grind stone.

On my ride Sunday I passed a large group of cyclists and found that they start not too far from me, so this weekend I plan to hit up their group ride and hopefully meet some new people. I’m wondering if that is what is missing, the comradery of cycling is what brought me in, the pushing your friends to get better and ride more, in essence, the exact opposite of Kevin. Being the Lone Ranger is lonely and is making me question why I care so much to sweat my ass off pushing myself until my eyes fall out of my head on a Tuesday after work.

Maybe it’s the heat just getting to me? It’s been hot and humid, to the point you can see the salt leave your body and dry on your handle bars. Thank god I have good eyebrows. I don’t know how people can go from this training schedule to living amongst the general population and not wonder “what if”? I’ve talked in the past that this training life is a drug and the feeling is worth it, but how do you stop?

Or maybe this was just very enjoyable on Saturday?

Saturday I did ride to my local trail and I must say, it is pretty awesome. 25 minutes of pedaling and up the first climb (Yes, this place has a hill or two) I see a Jason mask on a mannequin wearing a yellow jacket. I love this place already.

Maybe the XC Peezy is just dying and the adventure MTBer is taking over more and more. Every time I say that I confuse myself, because I love cross. Or did I love the social aspect of it more? The relationships you make along the way, all that stuff. It isn’t down here now, is it going to suck? Middle of October is coming, as well as 11/7 with Little Peezy.