TJ Woodruff ONLINE

Coming down from all of the Sea Otter hype is a pretty serious experience. Going from four days of racing and all of the little things that keep you busy, back to the ’simple life’ is quite a let down. Not that this is a bad thing, it’s just that you don’t realize how stressful racing can be until you get away from it. The poison ivy/oak is in full force and has taken my legs over, but its a good thing that I never really get itchy from things like this. GC results were calculated and I finished top 60 and likely top 40 for Americans though I didn’t take the time to sort through all of the countries.

The Sewanee is 100% operational once again as I rebuilt the SID and put on a new chain along with shift cables today. I can’t believe how much abuse these bikes can take and yet they still come back looking almost new. I was fortunate for the tech support offered by Magura and Fox as these guys literally saved my bike on two separate occasions. Thanks guys!

Tomorrow I might scout out the RR course for this weekends three-day stage race.  Either that or I’ll just pound out some quick intervals, whatever sounds more appealing once I get going… The course is a 16 mile lap with 900 feet of climbing, so it would be nice to find out how that 900 adds up since there isn’t a profile on the race website. All three events are within a thirty minute drive from Rosamond so I’m excited about the idea of racing from ‘home’.  I’ll be able to post race updates as the stages unfold so be sure to tune in this weekend. I couldn’t believe it when my hit counter added up over 180 viewers on Monday alone. Who are all of you?!?  -TJ

Sea Otter came and went in a flash and now I’m back in Rosamond. I’ve never done an event that had so much mud for each and every stage. Everyday involved a near-complete rebuild of the entire bike just to get things functional. I decided to stay in Monterey Sunday night to avoid a late night drive. This way I had the opportunity to take the Pacific Coast Highway today. Even with the rain the views were quite spectacular, that is until I came across a mudslide and had to back track the entire 60-odd miles that I had put in…. After three and a half hours of driving I was about two miles from the motel. Ouch. Rather than a five hour drive, today turned out to be eight plus hours in the car.

At least the views were nice…

The cross country main event started off going alright, and I felt pretty good for the first of two 20 mile laps. Near the end of lap one I crashed into a little kid that had tipped over right in front of me. Don’t ask me why this kid was riding on the trail side or where mom or dad where, I was just glad to hear that he was ok as we both picked ourselves up! This situation put me off the back of a pretty fast group and I was left to chase them down solo around the track.

On the long descent as lap two started my body began to shut itself down. The fifty degree temps and consistent rain may have added to my body’s chill, but the energy deficit from the first lap was pretty big too. After picking up several neutral feeds I redeemed myself a bit and put in a solid eight miles to finish out the race. 64^th isn’t a horrible result, but I know that I’m capable of much more in the racing to come.

As souvenirs I brought home a destroyed drivetrain, four sets of shot brake pads, a fork that needs to be rebuilt, and some shift cables that are locked within their housings… Oh yeah, and some poison ivy on the legs for good measure. And I thought the ‘mud treatment’ would be good for my skin!

After four days of racing I’m feeling somewhat tired out, but not totally wasted. Recovery will be the name of the game until this weekend’s Palmdale Stage Race. So overall the Sea Otter was a good weekend and a great experience, despite the less than stellar results. You have to start somewhere though, right? -TJ

SuperCross Action captured by Tom Rinehart

The first two stages of the Otter have come and gone quickly. Today’s  TT wasn’t even five minutes long, so quick can be taken in literal terms. Both stages were very muddy and required some serious slop riding skill. I’m learning the ropes of mud riding, but most of my energy only had me going sideways yesterday. Off of the bike, most of my time has been spent cleaning things such as dirty bikes, dirty clothes and dirty bikes again. Good thing the Econo Lodge has a nice bike wash setup.

Finding my game face just prior to TT staging.

The xc course is drying up very nicely so if the rain can hold off through Sunday we’ll enjoy primo conditions. I joined some fellow pro bloggers for a hot lap on the course today. Martini, Sager, Tristan and I put in a pretty quick ninety minute lap doing a ‘Boulder Slow’ pace. It was a good time out there and the legs responded well to the ride.  There were hundreds of sheep running around in one place so we had Jason get them out of the way for us. Perhaps Nick will post the picture he got of this sheep herding escapade…

So tomorrow the short track field is officially split into top and bottom 1/2 by gc. Unfortunately I’m in the top of that bottom half. Who knows, maybe I can ‘win’ 60th place. Expect a report tomorrow evening once all the gear has been cleaned once again.  Keep it real, TJ

In my last post’s title I mentioned, “The calm before the storm,” well, it was probably already storming then and it continues to rain now. Thunder and lightning add to the whole effect and I’ve got the heater on full blast in here since it’s pretty chilly out.

All things considered, it seems that I’ve found all of the precipitation that I missed out on during my Arizona winter.  No worries though, racing is racing, and rain or shine the battles will take place. Tomorrow I’ll have a chance to get out there and make some tire decisions. I’ve got several Kendas to choose from so I’ll be sure to have the setup dialed regardless of what the course looks like.

I’m holding down the motel solo for now as the Midwest crew will be getting in later tonight since they are driving a rental down from San Francisco. Not much else to report for now. I’m feeling very ready to race and not too stressed out about it. Traveling up here a day early was a good choice…. Keep it real, TJ

Wow, the eve of race season is officially upon us. The Sea Otter starts up on Thursday and weekend races are booked all the way through the end of May, each and every weekend… For now I’ll be resting up and just tooling around on the Sewanee a bit before the Otter takes off.

The training has been done and I feel well prepared to race hard. I’ve done more hard training in the last two months than in the previous five seasons combined. I guess that’s the difference between simply riding and actually training. It’s nice to have numbers indicating that I’ve improved my 20 minute power by 6% when compared to any previous personal bests. Now I just have to put these extra watts to good use on the trail! After all, results are what count.  Placing well in the Super Cross and the Time Trial will be key, as they are running fast and ’slow’ heats for the Short Track event, splitting the field on current GC standings.

I’m driving up to Monterey on Tuesday so once I’m up there you can expect daily live reports with all the highlights. There should be plenty of race action to talk about, a good change from ’same old’ training reports you’ve read on here all winter. Thanks for checking in. -TJ

I’ll leave you with this taken from the EuroSport Flanders recap:

“Boonen stated in no uncertain terms that even if Hincapie had joined the top-two at the finish, it would have made no difference.

“If they ride with me they ride for second place, but if they wait they go at the end,” Boonen concluded.

With confidence like this it is very tough to lose. Tough as nails…