Rain Rain Go Away

So in the last week and a half, there has been one sunny day, every other day it has rained all day and just been miserable. When it rains in Alaska it is not a warm rain, it is a 50 degree rain. Anyway I decided to buy myself some mud tires out of Chain Reaction Cycles sale bin. I chose the Michelin Wildgripper in the tubeless version. This tire is the best tire I have ever used in wet conditions, it rolls really fast, it rolls smooth, corners even in even greasiest sharp bends, but best of all, it didn't clog up when I climbed the steepest and wettest climb on the ride(that climb is hard to ride when dry, not to mention when its wet and slippery). The Wildgrippers are 670 grams and 1.95 inches wide. The only downside is that Michelin doesn't make the Wildgrippers anymore. So here are some pics of them.

Hammerman pictures.

Hammerman, almost.

So yesterday was the one triathlon in Alaska that I really look forward to. It is called the Hammerman Triathlon. I came into it with a lot of pressure having won last year, and it didn't help that Matt Novakovich was telling me that people are betting on whether myself or my teammate Adam Miller would win. I couldn't play his mind games so I biked off before the start to get into my own zone, and that helped, being in a forest all alone calmed me down for sure.
45 minutes later I hop in the water to warm up for the swim, and the nervousness went away. Then we start, im swimming within my limit, which is normally not super fast, but at halfway, I realize that im only 25 meters behind the leaders and with Shannon Donnelly, Alaska's most dominant female triathlete. I get out of the water with Shannon but got very dizzy in transition and had to sit down to even get my bike shoes on. So at the point of leaving transition, the big competitors are Jens Beck who was 2 minutes ahead, Andy Duenow and Adam Miller 35 seconds ahead, Luke Kiskaddon and Jason Lameroux 1 minute back and Matt Navokovich 8 minutes back.
Within minutes on the mountian bike leg, I pass Adam and Andy. Andy keeps up with me for quite a while till the most technical singletrack of the course. The uphill of death is what blew the gap, it turns out I was the only one in the race to ride the hill. Once up that hill I finally see Jens up in the distance, and I chase after him for the majority of the bike course until another singletrack section where I pass and get 25 seconds on him. I come into transition in first with a huge crowd cheering only to hear the crowd start cheering again much sooner than I had hoped. Jens was on the way and he is quite a runner. He catches me which was to be expected but I hung with him which was not to be expected. Eventually he pulls away.
In the end, Jens was the winner with me 55 seconds back, Andy 6 minutes back, Jason and Luke 7 minutes back, Matt 9 minutes back and Adam 10 back. A great race for me and a much better run than normal. Even though I won last year, I think I raced better this year.

So tonight I did the only short track race held in Alaska. It was a pretty fun race, the course was perfect for me and there was a light pole at the bottom of a super steep fast hill to dodge. It was 25 minutes +2 laps. Within 2 laps local road race champ, Matt Navokavich, and I broke away from the 20 person field. On lap 4 I try to get a gap on one of the two steep uphills. That did me no good. I tried again every other lap, but kept failing. Finally at 20 minutes in I notice that Matt is breathing way harder than I am. So I attack on the closest hill and got a gap, then I let him catch me at the bottom of the next uphill only to attack him again. This one sticks. I was able to hold it the next 5 laps to the finish. My first win since heading back to AK for the summer. Ill try to get some pics in the next few days. But I'm stoked.

Toulouse is the dare-devil kitty, and Soliel (pronounced So-Lay) is the very nice looking one. Except Soliel is super annoying, and she likes to climb up bare legs.

I'm still way sore from Mt. Marathon and that was 3 days ago. So I have some pictures of my families new kittens and a bike I just ordered.

MT. MARATHON

So every 4th of July fr the last 7 years my family and I have traveled to Seward, Alaska to do a race called Mt. Marathon. It is a brutal race from downtown Seward to the top of Mt. Marathon and back down. The whole race started 81 years ago from two drunk people in a bar betting that nobody could make it up the mountain and back down in less than an hour. Soon the whole town of Seward was in on it. Eventually they had the race and the drunk guy was just over an hour. Since then, the race has been held every year, the record up and down it stands at 43 minutes and 23 seconds. The race is so popular that the race directors separate it into 3 classes and limit the amount or racers. There are 200 participants in the junior race, 300 in the womens and 300 in the mens. Then every year they auction off 10 last minute race spots. They usually go for over $1000. Its crazy.
Anyway I did the thing in 55 minutes and 4 seconds. I was 32nd place in the mens division. The race was nuts though, cause at the top there was a huge snow field, so everybody is sliding on their butts at 20 plus miles per hour doing all possible to stay in control. Above are some pictures of me running through town at towards the finish. And then one picture of Jack and I after the finish. Jack also works at Chain Reaction Cycles.

Race Pics

Sick downhill singletrack.
First lap and still fresh.
Going through the feed 2 laps in.