Mixing it up: some high alpine cx bike riding outside of Bend.

Back in 1999, when I got back into cycling, I was at my favorite bike shop in Indianapolis contemplating buying a road bike. I hadn’t had a road bike since 7th or 8th grade, waaay back in ’77 or  ’78, so I had a lot of catching up to do. I had already started to get serious about mountain biking (or so I thought — a rookie’s definition of serious is actually way wide of the true meaning of the word.) Cycling had become more than a way to rehabilitate my injured legs though, it was a healthy obsession.

Mountain biking in Indianapolis was limited to less than 15 miles of trail in town, half of which was soon cleared for an invisible shopping center which, to this very day, is still not built. The “good” mountain biking (and it really is good) was a 92 mile drive south, and is something a group of us did somewhat regularly on Saturdays. It was far away and, yes, it took all day to do a three hour ride. Hence the need for a road bike. I was assured by my cycling friends I could ride all over town, more or less.

I had bought a Seven mountain bike, which I loved, so getting a Seven road bike was an easy sell for me. But one of the guys I regularly rode with and who also happened to work at the shop, a guy named Ross, suggested a ‘cross bike. What?

With my race car driver mentality, a ‘cross bike made no sense. I had a state of the art mountain bike, that I still crashed way too often, and I wanted – no – needed, a state of the art road bike. Compromised performance was not in my vocabulary. “It is fun,” he said, pointing to his own Seven ‘cross bike leaning in the corner. “It is a blast.”

Fun for me was knowing that my machine was the most efficient possible, as my cycling fitness was not up to par with most of my riding friends, which sadly, is still basically true today. Lets just say I was on the rivet on almost every ride. I did not need a heavier, less efficient bike (on the road) making me any slower than I already was. I also did not need a skinnier tire on the trails, either.

Fast forward to 2007, now living in Oregon, I decided that the hundreds of miles of fire roads criss-crossing the National Forests around Bend would be perfect for a ‘cross bike. So I had Seven (who else?) weld me up a straight gage Ti frame. That the frame sat on a hook in the garage for more than a year before I built it, says a lot about my then lack of appreciation for the discipline.

But ‘cross racing in the Northwest is a very big deal, and once I realized that everyone had a ‘cross bike, in addition to road and mountain bikes, I built the bike and rode it on some single track. Wow. Ross was right. The ‘cross bike IS fun. There is something about it I really like. The fact that it is rigid, the fact that you have to pay extra close attention to your line, that there is less room for error, the contact patch is smaller –– and best of all, that it weighs only 16.5 lbs. are things that appeal to me. I love railing tight single track on it, as fast as I can go. And to say the bike (not me) climbs like a mountain goat is an understatement.

It was only a matter of time before I started racing ‘cross. And although the bike is awesome, ‘cross racing is about as tough a sport as there is. I find it extremely difficult, and not a race goes by that I don’t ask myself why am I doing this. It is truly that hard. Racing is a way to push yourself past limits you could not otherwise get past. It is 45 minutes of pure hell and I mean that. There is no hiding, no sitting in. If you slow down, you get passed. It is not fun. The fun comes afterwards, when you realize that you just killed yourself and for what? For the beer afterwards? For camaraderie with teammates? For the self satisfaction of giving 100% and knowing that each pedal stroke at this ungodly effort is making you a stronger cyclist? Maybe.

For the record, I usually finish about mid pack in the Master B category and have never had so much fun not winning. I usually can not wait for the next race. But even better, I ride my ‘cross bike on all of our local single track – all hundreds of miles of it. Just today, I did a 3 hr, mostly single track, ‘cross bike ride. It was 35 degrees and snowing on and off. The bike was perfect, the trails were perfect, and so was the ride. I find myself thinking, “man, I love this bike!”

So Ross, thanks for the recommendation. Good advice, even 13 years later!

Whit

Sram Red: Is the best mechanical shifting the best shifting?

I am a bike greek, no doubt about it. And proudly so, too.

Despite a strong distaste for most things Vegas and a total disdain for huge trade shows, Interbike is heaven. The Handmade Bike Show? On my to do list, for sure. Simply put, I like bikes as much as I like riding them. And, I like cool bike parts too, from ultralight aftermarket brakes, custom frames, lightweight aero wheels, little carbon bits (like Parlee’s front derailleur hanger), to exotic cycling shoes… you get the idea. So, being a total bike geek/techno nut, when Shimano first came out with Di2, I was eager to see and experience it first hand. Reading about it only served to whet my appetite even more. On paper, it seemed like the coolest thing since carbon.

Finally, several months ago, I saw it in person. One of our local shops here in Bend had a Cervelo on a stand in the showroom equipped with the Ultegra version of electronic shifting. It was there to be experienced; there was not a “do not touch” sign to be seen. I stood there and turned the cranks for 5 or 10 minutes shifting up and down the cassette and the big ring to small. And back again. It was cool, no doubt about it. I especially liked the self trim on the front. Very nice. But, for some reason, and I don’t know why, it was a little disappointing. It might have been a case of not living up to expectations, to the preconceived notion of total perfection… probably not unlike running into Cindy Crawford at the grocery store. (Ok, bad example.) But it wasn’t a world changer for me, which is what I had expected. I fully expected to have to open a savings account for the new gruppo. I thought I would have to have one.

A few weeks later, I rode one for the first time. Just up and down the sidewalk during the Pro 1,2 race of a Friday night crit. So I was going slowly, not even in cleats. Again, there are things that are cool: perfect shifts. the whirling sound of the servo motor. And the self trim of the front derailleur. But I didn’t like a few things. As I went slowly up the sidewalk, I keep shifting to a higher and higher gear until my cadence was maybe 10. I couldn’t find the “button” to shift lower. It isn’t intuitive. And the shifter levers for up and down are very close together. I imagine full on winter gloves could be a problem. I guess you can mount the remote buttons somewhere else, but the actual shifter position could be better. Maybe it is a soul thing. It just didn’t seem to be so much better as to warrant a change.

Truthfully, I am glad I am not dying to have it. Which was not the case when I first rode Sram Red three years ago. Compared to the 7800 era Dura-Ace shifters I had been on, the Red’s were night and day better for me. The ease with which the chain goes down the cassette sold me. You barely touch the lever, and BANG! the chain is shifting down the cassette. And I found having one lever do all the shifting intuitive. By contrast, the feeling of the 7800 Dura-Ace’s are very vague. There is a lot of play and slop in the lever movement and after riding Red, I found the extra play not to my liking. I went out and bought two sets of Red Shifters and derailleurs, then later a Force gruppo for my ‘cross bike. There is something about the feel of mechanical that I like. I think it compares to new technology in modern race cars. Paddle shifters and automatic clutches are faster, yes, but are they as much fun as an old H pattern and heal and toe down shifting? Maybe not.

Another friend of mine dropped the hint that he has a Campy EPS group on order. I’ll beg for an afternoon on the bike when it shows up. Campy will be a new experience for me. It might ruin me. Super Record mechanical is the sexiest gruppo to look at, in my opinion, so I try not to stare whenever I see it on a bike. If I don’t see it, it doesn’t exist. Or something like that. But I do want to try the Campy electric. Can’t wait to ride it. I’ll let you know.

Whit

In breaking news, which first broke 13 years ago, Lance Armstrong allegedly used performance-enhancing drugs to win that little bike race in France. Seven times.

Really? Yawn.

Should we care? Yes and no.

What a waste of taxpayer’s money. Not that I condone cheating, absolutely not. But maybe we should care because millions of dollars have been––and continue to be spent––attempting to prove that a guy won bicycle races with artificial help. And this at a time when local law enforcement agencies around the country are out of money and cutting staff, meaning, of course, that real criminals might have an easier time of it. All in the name of fair sport, I suppose.

But fair sport, among other things, should be about maintaining a level playing field. Given the doping sanctions brought against many, if not all, of Lance’s closest rivals, it seems to me, if indeed Lance was juiced, the playing field might still have been level. If he was clean, he overcame a huge disadvantage. Which is, of course, highly improbable, no matter how gifted he is. For those of us who are fans of professional cycling, we’ve had our own opinions for years. Not that it matters. The guy is the real thing, a real badass dude, clean or not. Hell, he has sired more kids with one half-radiated ball than most men do with two good ones.

Some facts are indisputable, and non-cycling media, as well as the general public, overlook these facts because they have no clue. They have never turned a pedal in anger. Lance, doped or not, rode his ass off to win those tours. There was great theater, drama and the spectacle of someone giving his all every chance he could. No one can deny that Lance brought excitement to the race that the stars of today do not. Lance beat other (later convicted) dopers. So, rightly or wrongly, in my mind, he won those tours. He built the best teams. He probably trained more than his rivals. At the very least, it is accurate to say no one out-trained him. He made the huge efforts, sacrifices and commitments that it takes to reach the top of any sport. And remember, well before Lance won his first Tour, there was a huge doping culture in the sport. It ran deep. If riders wanted to keep their jobs they had to be competitive, and to be competitive against someone on EPO, well, you get the idea. Not doping meant not being a bike racer. And, to be sure, there are plenty of racers who made that choice and quit.

Look, I am no Lance ass kisser, even if it appears I am defending him. I am not. But Lance has done great things for millions of people. Despite reports that Livestrong does not do much for cancer research, what Livestrong and Lance have done is way more valuable. Lance has given cancer victims hope. I have seen it first hand, more than once. These are everyday people who are looking death in the eye. Lance has helped them. You can’t put a price on that.

Another journalist recently wrote that Lance is a “role model for millions of kids. These kids need to know that cheaters get caught and punished.”

Excuse me, but that writer has the role model thing wrong. Lance needs to be a role model for five kids, and five kids only. His own. Sports heroes are not role models, nor should they be. It is the job of parents to teach their values and morals to their own kids. And not leave it to TV shows, movies or worse, sportsmen who get paid huge, huge money to win.

There are champions of sport, even great champions, who are most definitely not role model material. Hell, even I had drag racing fans tell me I was a role model and that I should act a certain way. Please, no. Raise your own kids. You don’t know me; why would you use me as an example to follow?

It seems USADA has a case against Lance that may not be easily overcome. The odds are stacked, based on both the implied evidence and the way USADA is run. They are not unlike many sanctioning bodies in that they are judge, jury and executioner all in one. If they want you guilty, you will be found guilty. The subpoenaed testimony from the dropped Department of Justice investigation is most likely pretty incriminating. If the subpoenaed riders all said everyone is clean, that Floyd and Tyler made this stuff up, then it is highly doubtful USADA would have come forward with their charges. And, if they all admitted to doping, and all of the details of their testimony jives, he will go down.

What good that will do for society, or for that matter, professional cycling, I am not sure.

Whit Bazemore

Katie Compton, at Blitz to the Barrel in Bend, doing what it takes to win.

Let’s face it, sometimes watching the best athletes perform in their chosen sport can be boring. The very best make sport and winning look easy; no drama, no close calls, no nerves, just surefire confidence that smoothly leads them to the win.

Last Tuesday I witnessed such a performance up close. The annual Blitz to the Barrel, a one-of-a-kind mountain bike race, was held here in Bend. This invitation only, renegade-style race combines different elements of cycling: downhill enduro, cross country mountain biking, cyclocross and even road. The competitors start in the Cascade Mountains west of Bend, drop a few thousand feet on about 20 miles of pretty damn good single track, and then enter one of Bend’s toniest golf courses for a big air jump and some shredding on the driving range. (That in itself is worth the price of admission, which is free.)

The race ends in town seven miles later at 10 Barrel Brewing Company in front of hundreds of beer drinking partiers, and the racers have to down a pint to earn their finish. Normally an ice-cold craft brew sounds pretty darn good after a hard trail ride, but after an anaerobic hour of balls out racing, some bodies reject the beer. Which makes the spectating, um, more entertaining.

This year, the third running of the Blitz, promised to be the best yet. Various pros from mountain biking and cyclocross were committed, including eight-time national cyclocross champion Katie Compton. Bend recently played host to Compton’s dominating performances during the cyclocross nationals she won handily two years in a row. But this might have been different. The Blitz is fun. It’s for money and bragging rights, not fame, a jersey or endorsements. Just hanging it out to win a few grand and drinking with your friends afterward. Well, Katie laid it down and crushed them. Giant mountain bike pro Kelly Emmet was second.

I got to see some of the action up close, and Katie is one of those competitors who makes winning look easy. Through an uphill rock section, she powered through cleanly and smoothly, and considerably faster then the other women. While most of the others struggled in one way or another, Katie just looked smoother. It was amazing to watch. Katie made it look easy, you know, like “I could do this,” kind of easy. But others made it look hard. Which, of course, it was.

When I raced, I always tried to be the smoothest, most boring Funny Car driver I could be. My goal was to drive the car in the very straightest line possible. I wanted every spectator to think that they too could drive a Funny Car after watching me race. It might be more fun to watch someone all over the place, making the cars look like the real handful they are, but that person rarely, if ever, wins.

The same is true in cycling. Katie Compton led from start to finish, and with some of her competitors sporting a mixture of spilled beer and puke down the front of their jerseys, Katie just had one tiny drop on her chin after calmly drinking the whole pint.

Cheers to being the best.

The incredible McKenzie Pass features switchbacks reminiscent of famous cycling roads in Europe.

Every spring the McKenzie Pass, which connects the high desert of Central Oregon with the verdant Willamette Valley, is plowed so there is one lane between mammoth snow banks initially accessible only to cyclists and hikers. Later, as the walls of snow recede, McKenzie will be open to motorized vehicles. Even on the busiest of summer weekends traffic is light, and due to the winding nature of the road itself, usually slow.

Still, there is something very cool about cyclists owning a road, even for a short while. Just last week, the much-anticipated plowing of McKenzie took place, with local and regional cyclists rejoicing on email and social media. I am not exaggerating when I describe the McKenzie Pass, on a beautiful weekend day before it opens to cars, as the scene of a pilgrimage as cyclists of all ages and abilities––hundreds of them––ride in both directions up and over, usually pausing at the Dee Wright Observatory on the crest to survey the incredible view of the Cascade Mountains.

Walls of snow line the McKenzie Pass in spring.

Oregon just added the McKenzie Pass to its ever-growing list of Scenic Bikeways, which means this incredible road will get priority treatment for repairs and all things cycling, including the Oregon Pinnacles Tour and our soon-to-be announced three-day tours out of Bend and Sisters. Cool!

I used to travel between Seattle and Northern California every year for racing, and always built in time to stop in Oregon, just to ride. One of the first rides was, of course, the McKenzie. Being a flatlander meant I suffered. Big time. McKenzie is an up-and-over climb, so riding the whole thing means climbing to the top, descending to the bottom, turning around and doing it again in reverse. After 78 miles, and more significantly, 6,700 feet of climbing, you find yourself back where you started, a little more tired than you were at the beginning.

The east side of McKenzie Pass, from Sisters, is generally considered an easy climb. It may have an 8% grade in a spot or two, but it feels more like 6%. You do climb about 2,000 feet over 15 or so miles, but most of the gain is in the seven or eight miles before the summit. It is the west side of the McKenzie that tests both your climbing and descending abilities. From the 5,325-foot summit, heading west, it is a continuous 22-mile descent to the intersection with Highway 126, which marks the end of the McKenzie. The climb back up to the east is the real test. The middle section, Dead Horse Grade, has steep switchbacks, which are reminiscent of famous European climbs. It is the top section, when you pop out of the lush, old growth forest into a barren lava landscape with spectacular views of snow-capped volcanoes that is so captivating and unique.

Fast descent down McKenzie Pass back to Sisters, Oregon.

Living in Bend means I am able to ride McKenzie Pass almost anytime I want. Riding it from Bend is a bit of a commitment. The round trip from Bend to the top is about 90 miles, depending on the route. I like the five miles of dirt and gravel (Sizemore Road) as opposed to the two miles of busy state highway, but others have different tastes. Either way, it is a long, sometimes crushing ride.

Three BMC teammates and I rode the McKenzie last Sunday from Bend, and ran into a wall of snow just several hundred yards from the top, keeping us from hitting the summit. Only two days later, the wall was gone, and the road is now clear and open to cyclists (and hikers) from top to bottom. I think we will tackle it again on Memorial Day, this time leaving from Sisters and going up and over and back again. It will certainly be another test of fitness, as it always is, but “The McKenzie” is one road I can never ride too often.

-Whit

Lieto rockin' his TT bike on dirt.

I recently had the privilege of riding with professional triathlete Matt Lieto. Matt is a cool dude, and has an interesting story. Once he was, in his words, fat. Like sit-on-the-couch-all-day kinda fat. Two hundred and fifty pounds fat. Long story short, as a fat, and sometimes depressed 20-year-old, he went to Kona (God’s country if you’re a triathlete) to assist and hang with his world-class triathlete brother, Chris. In doing so, he had a life-changing moment; not that he decided to be his own world-class athlete exactly then, but he realized he had to do SOMETHING. Surrounded by many exceptional athletes, he was motivated.  Five months later he had lost 75 pounds. Twelve years later, he is a professional athlete in his own right, now racing with the K-Swiss Trek Team. Not depressed, certainly not fat, and incredibly fast on a bike.

Which brings us to a few weeks ago and our ride together. Bend is home to some exceptionally talented pro athletes, and these guys tend to train together when they can; mountain bike extraordinaires Adam Craig and Carl Decker, cyclocross champions Ryan Trebon and Barry Wicks, and Grand Tour contender Chris Horner, just to name a few. Somehow, I got hooked up with these guys (sans Horner and Craig, who were both on other continents) for an “easy” late-winter training ride.

That we did an “easy” (for them) 70-mile ride in just over three hours is cool for me, as it was all I could do to hang on for dear life. But the coolest thing was when four of us, at Matt‘s suggestion, decided to take the shortest way home, which included about five miles of some of Central Oregon’s finest dirt roads. Did I mention he was on his super cool TT bike? In the aero position?  I always think it’s cool to ride dirt on a road bike, but a pro triathlete doing it on a time-trial bike brought the coolness factor to new level. Sweet!

Surprisingly sweet, car-free dirt road.

There are many road cyclists who avoid dirt roads like the plague, but once you embrace them, they can add a lot to a ride. Sometimes, they can not be avoided. If you want to get somewhere, and the alternative is a busy highway, the dirt option is always best. Other times taking the dirt route is just more fun.

We have a few, short dirt sections during the first day of the Oregon Pinnacles Tour. They are what I call “great dirt” because, quite honestly, they are smoother than a lot of pavement. Not only are these sections easy to ride, they are incredibly scenic, and virtually car-free. They are part of an unbelievable route. The dirt sections aren’t that long, only about six miles total of a 109-mile day. Afterwards, you will probably be disappointed to learn there won’t be more dirt sections on the rest of the trip!

You will take away many, many things from a week spent with us at Ride Cycling Tours, and maybe one of them will be a new desire to take your road bike out on some dirt roads. If you haven’t tried it, you don’t know what you’re missing.

-Whit

Whit launching down the quarter mile in a nitro-fueled funny car.

It may seem incongruous. What’s a guy who drove nitro-fueled race cars at more than 300 miles per hour for 18 years doing running a cycling tour company? After making my living in NHRA Drag Racing by piloting top-fuel dragsters and funny cars down a quarter-mile track, pulling more than five gs, sometimes on fire, you can see that some people might think I’d find riding a bike comparatively sedate.

But I found lots of things on my bike, even while I was still professionally driving. I found rehabilitation after a motorcycle accident. I found respite from the uber-competitive world of car racing. I found a higher level of fitness and mental clarity. I found new routes, new friends and even my wife. But most of all, I found moments that would have been hard to experience in a car, insulated by steel and glass.

Some of my favorite moments:  riding with my good friend Mike Dunn, an all-around tough guy who was a naturally talented Fuel Funny Car driver I admired, out of racetracks all over the country in Lycra bib shorts and jerseys. You could see people thinking, “What the…?!” Ultimately, I believe our small group of drag racing cyclists, which also included former Indy Car driver Parker Johnstone, maybe helped sensitize NHRA fans by putting familiar faces underneath cycling helmets. More moments: riding Mount Evans with my wife, Michelle, in complete, high-altitude, car-free quiet, and then hearing the sound of heavy hooves on rocks as large, white mountain goats scrambled up to the road side to check us out. Exploring a new route in rural Ohio and getting caught in a hellacious thunderstorm with Mikey and Michelle, who still joke about “another one of Whit’s great rides.”

No matter what your “other life” might be, cycling brings people from all walks of life together. It erases boundaries and forms a kinship among people who otherwise might not give each other the time of day. But as we know, suffering on a bike can lay your soul bare. There is not much you can hide from your riding buddies on a hard ride. You put yourself out there, and in doing so, you discover what you are made of. It must be the suffering that bonds cyclists together and forms friendships that transcend cycling. I realize that most of my best friends are cyclists. I even met my wife of ten years on a bike ride. Need I say more?

My career gave me a lot of things:  a sense of satisfaction, success and victories in the sport’s biggest and most prestigious races, and maybe, most importantly, the self confidence that comes from succeeding when all the odds where against me. It also gave me the opportunity to ride all over this tremendously diverse country, including the Pacific Northwest, where we now live. The cycling is amazing here. Not only is the riding in Oregon incredibly scenic and beautiful, but it’s also safe and enjoyable because of relatively few vehicles on many of my favorite roads. Oregon’s notorious land use laws help keep sprawl at bay, and as a result, there is very light traffic outside our towns and cities.

I love studying maps and coming up with new rides that are even more beautiful, or more undiscovered than the last, and then sharing them with my friends. This is why I created Ride Cycling Tours. It seemed natural. The Oregon Pinnacles is my route. It is our toughest, most scenic, diverse and challenging multi-day ride we have on the 2012 schedule. It will test you and reward you. And it will leave a lasting impression. If you’re like me, you will leave this ride reluctantly, and you will plot, plan and devise a way to move to Oregon. Just so you can ride these rides any time you want to. They are that good.