Rob Ballou

Racing 2009

The 2009 season has ended, and partially for my own records, but also to maybe share something useful I wanted to recap the season. This year I took part in 14 mountain bike races (up from having done 2 last year), 7 cyclocross races, 1 run, and 1 off-road duathalon.

Mountain Biking

This year I added some standard cross-country mountain bike races (XC) to my race "schedule". Last year I only had done one short track cross country (STXC) and one 6 hour solo endurance race. So this year, I covered over 200 racing miles with XC races, STXC races, one 6 hour solo, and one epic race.

I think the major race that I haven't covered here before is the BTEpic, a 56 mile "out and back" style race through some of the most epic singletrack in the state. The longest ride I had done to date (on my mountain bike) was about 48 miles, so this was going to be a long day for me. And what started as a beautiful sunny day quickly turned into a rainy, cold battle of will. Creek crossings, flooded trail, roads, mud, and climbing (lots of climbing). This was a truly -- to re-use the word -- epic 7+ hours on the trail. And I'm looking forward to this for next year and hopefully getting my time down to 6 hours!

Gear

Early in the year I ran a Maxis Ignitor on the back and a Kenda Nevegal on the front wheel. This setup was good for the kind of sloppy beginning of the season, but I wasn't completely happy with the Nevegal on the back. It's a great mountain bike tire, but not necessarily a good race wheel. When things dried out (and the short track races were coming up) I switched the Ignitor to the front and put on a Specialized FastTrack SWORKS on the back. This made some fast rolling and good turning confidence. The Ignitor may not be the best on the front in that setup, but I liked that it provided a nice cornering profile and rolls reasonably well. And it cleans mud pretty well, to boot.

Before the BTEpic, I got some Stan's notubes.com wheels and switched the tire setup again to a Specialized Captain up front and a Specialized Fast Track on the back. This setup worked really well, even in the bad conditions during the epic.

Cyclocross

Last season I learned the hard way that mountain biking ends in October. Even then, many racers have turned their attention to cross (CX). This year I had a great opportunity to buy a team bike at discount so I took up the red-line-inducing sport. After a promising start in the beginner race in Hermann (2nd place), I quickly realized it is going to take a year or more to really get the feel for this sport. I've now down seven races and love it. But that's what I wanted: a challenge and this sport delivers.

This year I stared out with Continental Speed Kings, but after some singletrack riding, commuting, and cross practices, the back was becoming bald so I switched to a Maxis Larsen Mimo on the back. I still appreciate having good cornering lugs on the Speed King and both have worked well in sand, mud, and dry grass. The Speed King was pretty packed on in the last race -- a true mud race -- so I definitely recommend something when 1/2 of the course is the soft stuff! I wish I could run either tubulars or a tubeless setup for cross, but am going to wait until next season (or longer).

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