Team News & Race Reports

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Monday, May 25, 2009

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Upcoming Adventure Races:

Planet Adventure Urban Sprint - August 15th

Indianapolis Adventure Race - Septebmer 19th

NSAAR Women's Only Adventure Race - October 10th

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

New Race Series


Rootstock Racing is happy to announce a new trail running race series. Coming this July, the Tuesday Night Trail Race Series (TNT) will present a series of 6 trail races on Tuesday evenings. The first race will be held at the beautiful Indy Southwestway Park on July 21st.

For more information, please see the TNT Race Website.

Directed by: Rootstock Racing

Monday, May 04, 2009

Race Report: 2009 3-State 3-Mountain Challenge

By Michael Sapper

Just returned from my third year riding in the 3 State 3 Mountain Challenge starting in Chattanooga, TN. In excess of 2,000 cyclists participate. The 3 State is a single day century (100mile) road ride with major climbs up Suck Creek (Tennessee), Sand (Alabama) and Lookout Mountain (Georgia) plus dozens of minor hills we refer to as “rollers” that would be featured climbs in Indiana’s Hilly 100. The total elevation climb for the day is in excess of 7,000 feet.

After two prior years of rainy less than perfect weather, we were greeted to another Saturday morning 8am start with overcast skies and a probable chance of moderate rain. Well at least this year it didn’t start to rain until 7:55. I’ve now ridden 300 miles at the 3 State with certainly less than 30 miles of that on completely dry pavement. The only good news this year was that the temperature was in the 60’s and much warmer than prior years.

The Suck Creek Mountain climb begins about 10 miles into the ride and by that time it had been pouring for miles. Climbing in the rain is really not that bad, even though the temperature drops as you gain altitude, the heat you generate with the effort compensates. I stopped at the summit to put on my thin water resistant jacket for the chilly 5 mile decent. This is where things can get interesting fast. At last years event we had dry pavement descending Lookout Mountain and I remember approaching 50 mph in sections. However with rain sheeting off the road it took heavy pressure on the breaks to keep my speed under 20. Kissing the pavement this early in the season was just not an option. It’s quite amazing how little stopping power you get with the rear breaks in wet conditions. I would guess that on the decent I passed just a few riders while being passed by 50, 75 riders? Needless to say I got quite cold at the bottom of the decent which ends at the first SAG stop. Grossart and Garrison having crushed the climb before me were nowhere to be found. They, like me made a brief stop at the SAG to get some water and continued the ride in an effort to maintain some body warmth in the wet conditions.

It would be 20 miles before the second SAG and I spent that time mostly riding by myself while occasionally hopping into faster groups as they passed. With the rain soaked roads, group riding was only an option if you didn’t mind “rooster tails” from the other rider’s wheels spraying your face with a nice water/road grime combination. I was riding this section a little harder than I planned but I figured that would be my best chance to catch the GG train (Grossart/Garrison). After dealing with some to close for comfort lighting strikes, the rain started to taper off vastly improving the riding conditions from “this really sucks” to “OK, I guess I can deal with this for another 5 hours”. Rolling into the second SAG at mile 40 it was nice to see the GG train parked with Garrison walking around the parking lot in his socks. (You’ll need to read about that in his blog post).

I stayed on with them until the base of the second major climb when they dropped me (like a brick) going up Sand Mountain. At the summit I had the fortune of joining up with another rider and we made some nice time pace lining on the increasingly “not so wet pavement”. I re-joined the GG train at the mile 60 third SAG (would that make me the caboose?) Around 75 miles out I was wondering if it might be a good idea to consider if I wanted to stay with the train and get de-railed on the last major climb up Lookout Mountain or pull off and “smell the roses” for a while, rest up, and solo in for the last climb/ 15 miles to the finish. The roses won! I did a micro pull of the pace-line (Nano pull if you’re an Apple fan) and pulled off. By that time the weather had cleared a bit more and I actually spotted dry patches of pavement. The fourth SAG is ¼ mile before the start of the last major climb and the fifth is at the top. The climb is only 2.4 miles but starting at mile 83 and very steep near the top, it does take a bit of effort. Having the last two SAG’s less than 3 miles apart might give you an idea of just how hard this climb is. The third climb came and went with a good deal of effort and even more focus. After a short stop at the fifth and last SAG to grab some water you continue on with lots of those “rollers,” one being immediately after the SAG.

I rode this entire 15 miles primarily alone and not so much “smelling the roses” as I was hoping to finish in 6 hours 30 minutes or less. This section has about 5 or 6 of these rollers until you gradually reach the Town of Lookout Mountain before descending the last few miles into Chattanooga and on to the finish. The Lookout decent is my favorite of the three and the skies had cleared enough for a spectacular view to the valley some 1,500 feet below.

I rolled into the finish with an unofficial time of 6 hours 32 minutes. The GG train had finished about 15 to 20 minutes prior. I will be returning for a fourth trip in 2010 and you guessed it, hoping for no more freaking rain.

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