Friden/Knowles Race Report

Philip and I decided to make the trek to Fontana and represent the B
Team.

Our performances turned out to be more like the D Team. The
attached photo is as close as we could get to the podium?

We did have a fun conversation with the Rocky Mountain Bike rep and he is going to be in town Tues & Wed and we may get to demo some cool rides. Stay tuned for details.

As a follow-up to Peter’s Fontana report, my opinion was that the course was pretty tough. Having no idea what to expect, I pretty much just jumped on my bike and rode it cold… and the results speak for themselves. The course was not exceptionally long and the climbs were not that tough, but there were so many tricky technical parts I crashed twice and couldn’t get into any sort of rhythm. I saw tons of other guys crashing as well, riders leaving the course with bloody heads and broken fingers. When speaking to the Rocky Mountain bikes rep he said that it had gotten noticeably worse over the three days and by Sunday it was down right bad. I felt pretty beat up by it but I guess I can’t whine too much because some riders were able to get good results, this is a course that a pre-ride would really help. Sounds to me like the Del Mar folks were having more fun

Philip “Taser” Friden

Great Job Pete!

Yesterday afternoon I headed down to beautiful Fontana for SoCal series #2 and the National series opener and a lovely 8 am Sat. morning start.

The race was good and bad for me. The good was the best race I’ve had in a long time. It may have been two weeks straight in my ‘stretchy pants’ or Matt’s advice to pace myself but I managed to ride 3, 37 minute laps and finish only two minutes back of guys like Ron Takeda and Todd Booth that were 10-12 minutes ahead of me at Bonelli. The bad was totally blowing my chance to beat my nemesis from last year (the guy who won all the sport 35-39 races). He beat me by over 8 minutes at Bonelli so I was surprised to be on his wheel mid way through the second lap. That is where I stayed the rest of the race (except for a small pit stop to try and fix my water bottle cage that was falling off) planning to take him in the final 50 yard sprint. I was super confident I would take him but ended up completely botching the sprint; wrong gear, wrong line, everything, and missed the podium and 5th place by half a wheel. Oh well, the legs were good and I kept the cramps at bay.

Looking forward to hearing today’s San Dimas report and good luck to those racing tomorrow in San Dimas and anyone going down to Fontana for Sunday’s races.

Pete

San Dimas TT Results

Gabe Garcia is our on the spot reporter emailing back these results on the terrific effort Team Chicken Ranch is making in San Dimas. Fly Chickens!

Cat 3 winning time 13:37

Matt 28th 16:18
Druber 34th 16:21

Womens 3/4 winning time 17:44

Kimberly 23rd 20.06

Cat 4 winning time 15:28

Gabriel 43rd 17:38

Cat 5 winning time 15:16

Brett 6th 17:24

Testrider Is Calling You Out!

Mr. Ben "Burn" Edwards of Testrider fame is calling all you roadies out for what he says is an epic ride. Check it out below.

May 17th is a little event called Sea to Summit.

Basically Ventura to Mt Pinos on the 33. 85+ miles, tops out at 8,300' with over 12,000' of climbing.

The final climb is 14 miles long. I realize this conflicts with Firestone, but for the pure road crowd this is a truly epic event.

Only a 100 or so ever sign up and of those about 10 go to race it.

Check out the course...
http://home1.gte.net/res19999/sea2sum.jpg
more info...
http://www.cibike.org/page7.html
Testrider will have a follow vehicle for support.

Best,
Ben

Want to Race?

I don't know if any of you have seen this in the news recently, but the tallest man on the planet just got a bike. He is 8 feet 5 inches tall. Keyetv.com has more details. There is also a video you can check out on Bicycle Blog. Wow!

John Goodman Strikes Again!

John Goodman has people in high places. If you take a look at the recent Mountain Bike Action you can see some of our local heros photos on the site. It is included with the race report from the 20th Annual Keyesville Classic. You can see some photos of many of the Platinum riders and that one Chicken that keeps showing up in their photos. :o) Great Job John and everyone that raced and supported their local heros. I hope I see all of you at Fontana this weekend!

Come Out And Help

Everyone who rides a mountain bike is welcome to join us this weekend out at the Stump Grinder Dirt Club for a great weekend of hanging out, riding and a bit of trail work.

Anyone who wants to camp Friday or Saturday night is welcome to coordinate with me or Tony G tony_gamberutti@hotmail.com. Riding will happen both Saturday and Sunday after 12 Noon. There will be hotdogs and Sodas both days at 12 Noon as well! All we’re asking is that anyone who comes up be willing to do some trail work Saturday and Sunday mornings from 8 AM to 12.

There will be a Full Moon XC ride of the entire NMBS XC loop too!

Please make it if you can, and one day is better than none so please make it!

Enjoy the ride,

Mike Hecker – Owner
SG Productions – http://www.ridesb.com/
Santa Ynez Valley Classic presented by Platinum Performance – May 15th - 18th, 2008
220 Arden Road
Santa Barbara, CA 93105
(805) 896-0673
hecktone1@cox.net