ICEMAN COMETH (2009)

So everyone talks about the Iceman as the mountain bike race.  I have been racing for around 3 years now and despite all of the Iceman talk I never went to the race, until this year.  I see myself as being a slight adrenaline junky so the thought of racing sandy two-track never really appeased me.  This year I got talked into it by one of my buddies that I use to work with because his neighbor decided to back out and wanted to sell his entry ticket.  For a month or so I kept turning it down, until one night (drinking one of my free beers that I won at a cross race) I told him that I would do the race.  Anyone that knows me now-a-days, realizes that a single Founder's beer will get me a little loose so I was easily convinced that evening.  That was the start to my first Iceman!

As we got closer to the big event, everyone starting getting excited and antsy.   I just focused on the local cyclocross races and brushed it off.  My good buddy, Bill Gallagher, and I were talking one day and he didn't have anyone to go up with him so I said we could roll up together.  Now, Bill is a veteran of the Iceman and I would suggest that anyone thinking about doing it for the first time to go with a veteran because Iceman isn't about the hours on a bike.  Sure, I road my bike through the woods for a few hours which is always exciting, but Iceman is everything that goes on before and after the race.  Most races are a less then a day event constituting: waking up, drinking coffee, driving in a car, riding a bike, and going home to vegetate.  Well with Iceman, you go the day before, walk/pre-ride the last few miles of the course, hang around the packet pick-up/bike expo for hours, barely sleep, get up, drink coffee, ride your bike, drink fluids, watch the pros, drink more fluid, go to the hotel, get a shower, go downtown for the after parties, drink more fluids with all your buddies, walk miles back to the hotel, sleep for a few hours, drive home.  Now that is a good time!

I think the event is a great event to go to just because of the atmosphere, but those that want to hear about the actual race then read on.

I was scheduled to leave with my wave (70+ riders) around 10:05 am, so Bill and I were riding around and used the first few miles to warm-up before I had to go off.  I thought I had some more time to get a few quick intervals in so I could get the heart ready but Ben caught me and told me we are already lining up.  I went to the staging area and we positioned ourselves right in the front of the pack.  I had a goal of top 10 but I was really going for broke.  This meant I had to stay with the top group in my class and hope I could stay with them for 29 miles.  Everything went fine, at first, we took off, I hugged the rear wheel of the top guys and we hauled the mail for a long time.  After a few miles there was only 7 to 10 of us in the front and we started passing racers from the previous groups every few seconds.  Then I pulled a stupid maneuver; a rider in front of me got a little squirrely in the sand so I broke out to the left to realize it was switching to singletrack to the right.  I didn't really see a hole to get back in, but I went through some under brush in between some tree trunks and wasn't able to square back up with the trail, so down I went.  I tried to get on my bike as fast as possible but didn't see the pack anymore.  I gave it all I had to try and catch them but was running into traffic in all the wrong places so passing was not an option.  One new thing that I witnessed at Iceman is the option of passing.  Calling out passes on your left or right is typical, but at Iceman middle is also an option.  It was a strange feeling at first, but I grew to recognize the power of just shooting between two riders when they were occupying the two track.  But this story ends with a little sadness, somewhere around 25 miles I stood up to climb a hill and felt the lump form in my right thigh and knew that was all I had to give for the day.  Shortly after that I heard Ben yell my name and tell me to follow him in, which gave me a short burst of energy, but once the next climb came I had to sit down and watch Ben power away.  Ben is just amazing when it comes to sustaining long distance power and I was so proud that he had a chance to possibly get a top 10 finish since I knew there wasn't that many riders in our class out in front of me.  Once I was finished, I tried to get off my bike only to realize I couldn't stand at all and decided to sit down next to a tree and drink some water.

Bill came over to find me and gave me some good moral support. My excitement came back as we headed back to the car so we could get Bill back to the start for the Pro race.  After I watched Bill take off with the Pros and dodge a crash only a few hundred yards from the start, I headed back to the finish area.  I went to look up my time and I squeezed in a 20th spot finish with a time of 2:12:11 and Ben finished 13th with a time of 2:09:09.  I caught up with Dan Frayer and we watched the Pros come blasting through the last mile of the course with Bill ending up in mid-pack with a time of 1:43:04!  Just amazing performance Bill, especially for your first showing in the Pro class at Iceman.  You can view all the results here: Iceman Cometh Results.

So, Chris has thrown some hints out there that I have been riding a 29'er.  I guess now is a good time to come clean; I am well pleased with my choice of my custom built Niner EMD with the Niner carbon fork and Velocity wheelset for this race.  I won't go into too much detail here because I will be writing a separate post just for my new short-track friend.