David Singlespeed Unrau

Yesterday was the inaugural Ontario Cup Singlespeed race at the Mansfield Outdoor Center. The new singlespeed category was well represented with around 20 guys and 3 girls. The weather was cold and gray for pre-riding on Saturday, but Sunday was pleasantly cool and perfectly sunny. The singlespeed start was at 9:30 - the early start was a shock to my system. I’ve grown accustomed to the 1:30pm starts lately. Some big guns showed up for the race with a couple of elite riders including Josh Hall out at the start line. With a last minute vote on the start line, the race length was bumped up from 2 laps to 3, leaving me a little unprepared on the nutrition side. The start was up hill, and I managed to stay with the lead group up the hill into the first single track sections. The race went smoothly. The traffic on the course was a different experience as we started behind a lot of slower groups. However, everyone was friendly and professional, so passing generally went very smoothly. My race went very well, I ended up 7 minute down from Josh, which I am happy with for now! The field was pretty strong, so this was only good enough for 5th place. It was a good race and has motivated me to push hard for the rest of the season. I raced on my full rigid 29er, WTB Nanorapter tires at around 27psi, 34:18 gearing. I think the set up was pretty good. The ground was moist with lots of grip. A sketchier tire like the Stan’s crow might have worked well. Here is what the course looked like:

Here is the vertical profile:

…and this is what my heart rate looked like:

My race average is only 174 BPM, well down from what I was expecting. This is down from what I have been seeing this year and last, despite feeling like I was working just as hard. Either I still have to acclimatize to the off road (everything, training and racing, so far this year has been essentially road riding), or I’m still getting over the flu that is going around. In either case, it’s looking good for the rest of the season!

Make sure to check out everyone else’s reports over at the True North Cycles race team website!

Make sure to swing on over to Mathew Spak’s site and catch up with another Ontario endurance racer.  Some good info for people getting into 24 hour racing.

Well, this was my shortest Paris to Ancaster race so far. The weather was perfect - sunny, a high of around 24 and a light tailwind that strengthened througout the day. I was racing on my cross bike, singlespeed (42:16), with Michelin Jet tires. The set up was pretty good. A gear harder might have been better, but its hard to tell. After a very fast start, I tryed to stay with Andrew, who was also on a singlespeed CX bike, but with a 44:16 gear. On the opening rail trail I couldn’t match his speed and dropped back to work with some of the other True North riders. I worked with Adam for a while, but the initial effort had put me in a bit of a deficit, and I had to sit up for a while. One hour in I was feeling good and working to move back up. Coming through a rail trail section I picked up a stick in the spokes that ended up wrapped around the hub, not really touching anything. I kept going to the next section and was fiddling with the stick while moving when ‘crunch’, the back wheel locks up. I skid to a halt and dismount to clear out the stick. Unfortunately, the stick took out 4 spokes and the wheel was locked because it was so far out it was jammed against the frame….and that was it for my race. Fortunately Poosie got the word through the grape vine that I was on the side of the road, because next thing I know she showed up in the truck to shuttle me to the finish in air conditioned comfort! Here is the route of the first half of the race:

Here is what the profile looked like:

…and here is what my heartrate looked like while the race lasted:

For the first 20 minutes or so its pegged at around 182 or so, which is a little too high for this early in the season!

Make sure to check out the True North Cycles team website for updates from everyone else!

Finally! This weekend I’ll be racing in the 60km Singlespeed catagory in the Paris to Ancaster race. The race is going to be big this year. 1600 are already registered and they are capping registration at 2000. This is always a fun race. With >1500 racers, traffic off the start is always an issue, but everything tends to spread out pretty quickly. The race is a mix of pavement, gravel and non-technical trail. There are a couple of sections that are always muddy. They’re almost better when it is wet, as the mud doesn’t stick as much! We’ll see what they are like this year. We missed the race last year as we were teaching Sprockids rather than racing. Lots of True North riders will be out this weekend - mostly on singlespeeds. The singlespeed catagory will be tough this year - some of the faster people that I know have decided to take on the singlespeed catagory this year….