Maui video

Here's the video from the Maui trip. Didn't do a short version for blog visitors so you get the full family archive edit which is a little long. The dolphins are at the end, around minute 16 or so if your wanting the main highlight. Very fortunate morning at La Perouse Bay where we stopped to find people with binoculars watching dolphins about 3/4 mile out. We grabbed our fins and masks and headed out, only to find nothing once we got to where we thought we needed to be. We'd started back when they popped back up - about 14 total that stayed in smaller groups of 3 or 4. It was pretty surreal being out in the open water with them, they stayed around for about 15 minutes without ever acting like they were very interested in our being there, but always keeping about a 10-15 foot space between us. We were mesmerized.

Our soundtrack while on the trip was Xavier Rudd, so his music naturally made it's way onto the video. You're welcome if you're not already familiar with his stuff - exceptional.

Some brief color commentary on a few highlights and the vid:

We got into Maui around 9:30 pm, and rather than drive over to Lahaina and then back the next morning, we just headed straight up to Haleakala to catch the sunrise. We went about 2/3rds the way up the volcano, pulled over next to some cattle, and dirtbagged it in the car to sleep for the night. In the a.m. we were fortunate to get the cloud carpet below the peak that makes for quite a spectacle when the sun makes it's way up the horizon - can't do it justice trying to describe it so won't, nor does the video capture it, but totally unique from anything we've ever seen.

Stopped for a quick hike/run through the Redwood forest on the way down - we were needing something invigorating after the flight out and the early morning, and this did the trick nicely. The Redwoods there were relatively young, so big, but not huge. Cool trail, several transitions from alpine, to rain forest, even some real dry, high desert type terrain on the northern edge.

We had dinner that night with Earl and Sandy. Got a table next to the ocean with a fortunate view of some whales jumping out of the water a ways out - that was a first for both Annie and I. Wasn't a close up view - but amazing none the less to a couple of kids from Utah.

We went pretty hard the rest of the trip - tried to put a little bit of most of it on the video. We rented some bikes and made an attempt at going from sea level to the 10,000 ft summit of Haleakala, but hit cold and weather a little past 6,500 ft' that we weren't prepared for, so abandoned and rode back down. Blow holes, snorkeling, swim approach bouldering, waterfalls, mountain/rain forest hikes, caves and lava tubes, Hana, paddleboarding and surfing, could have used one more day to relax - we came home tired. But truth be told, that's how we like it.

One of our favorite trips ever.



Huge thanks to a couple of our favorite friends - Earl and Sandy, who provided their sweet digs to serve as base camp, thank you again, we absolutely loved it!

Late summer through UTCX #3

You ever go a while without cleaning up and you end up with a pile of dirty clothes, etc... sitting in the corner of the room. That's what this post is, that pile - a quick and dirty clean up of the last month or so....

Annie raced and won the USCS Draper SuperXC - hot, hard day. She won her sport class, and collected another big check for fastest overall sport time. She also ended up winning the series for her class. Fantastic rookie year for her on the Mtn. Bike. She capped the summer off by taking a digger while out riding with her girlfriends, led with her face and head, smashed her lip open, chipped a tooth, and concussed herself pretty good. Took a while for her head to get back to feeling normal - but she came out pretty good for punching a rock with her face/head.

Next up was a Euro trip to Vegas to celebrate our anniversary. Swung through Valley of Fire on the way, where I stalked-ok, guess I can't call it stalked if he's looking right at me, we'll call it chased-this sheep to get within photo range. They grow em' big in the protected parks.

We also did our first hike in a sweat lodge, minus the lodge part - check out the temp. Little excursion to some little water hole out in the sandstone. We had visions of jumping into it until we saw it - putrid.

Here's the euro part of the trip - took a Fiat out for the long weekend - sweet, fun little cars. Think it paid for itself with the savings in gas - don't think we spent more than $100 bucks in gas down and back.
Kids started learning to fish a bit....

Brock finally paid a price for one of his stunts - gutted his arm just under his armpit jumping off a playset where a screw hooked it. Came in crying, didn't pay much attention to him until he pulled his shirt off and saw the hamburger hanging out - then out to the car pretty quick. He'd stopped crying on the way down when I began the pep talk about getting his first stitches. Spent the rest of the ride down listening to him insist he just needed a band aid, to turn around and take him home so he could get a band aid. I love his Rambo spirit.
Next up was Xterra - I had a comped entry for the triathlon, so did the short course. My swim was slow, but a success as I put an entire swim together without resorting to rolling onto my back or breaking form, that's a first for me, baby steps. Rode the bike well, than had the traditional melt down on the run, it was brutal. You probably won't want to watch the entire clip, but here's on board footage of the bike course from a slow swimmers perspective. They've widened the singletrack since I last did this race, so traffic, although it was there, was not the time penalty it used to be, plenty of room to ride around it all the way up. It's a really great course.

Annie raced the 10k trail run, and true to form, landed herself on the top of the podium.... she's ridiculous. This one was literally done with about 4 weeks of total inactivity after the concussion.

This was my favorite pic of from the Xterra weekend - amid the serious game faces prepping for the start, she's right in the middle being a total screwoff. The dude won it though, so she picked a winner.


CX season: Two races the first week at the state fairgrounds. First day was rough for both of us. We'd done some handling and skill practice in preparation, but no top end effort type work. That's never going to feel good, and it didn't.

Day two was more of the same for me. Annie came around a bit and put a better race together - seemed to be back near where she was at the tail end of last year, which bodes well. Decided over the next few days that we'd bump her up to the A flight the following week. UTCX #3 was at one of our favorite tracks, Ft. Buenaventura in Ogden. I raced dramatically better, had some rider error type things - dropped my chain twice and totally hacked the barriers the first lap through, but put in a good start and felt like I was able to ride hard the entire race. Wasn't sure that was going to happen all year after the first weekend.

Annie went out with the A's and got exactly what we were wanting to get from it. She rode hard, paid attention to how things transpired a little differently in that group, and held her own just fine. She also looks very good thanks to our friends over at DNA Cycling. Turns out their women's stuff goes perfectly with her fave helmet. I've got one of their skin suits on it's way, and can guarantee you I won't look as good in their stuff as Annie does, but looking forward to it nonetheless.

Happiness

Took the day off for the last hurah of the summer with the kidlets before they head back to the classroom. I gotta tell ya, these jokers are my favorite people in the world, don't know how a guy can be anything but happy being surrounded with this kind of stuff.

Now that's the best kind of stuff - but not far behind it is watching your wife win a tough Mountain Bike race a few days prior. More on that later.

Heck of a bookend to a heck of a summer road tripping with the clan, we're run down and haggard, but in a good way. Getting back into the rigid schedules of the school year will take some getting used to, but Annie and I are thinking it will feel like a nice break.

Pierre's Hole 100, or 50, race

Quick recap of the Pierre's Hole race the weekend before last.

Aside from plate #1, which signifies that either 1 - you've earned it and are the designated guy to beat, or 2 - you were more anxious to sign up for the race than anyone else at the start line, (only the former applies here), the most sought after plate number in the field is this one.

....and I was handed this number at the check in under the oath of representing it the way your supposed to - by riding with the strength and gumption of 3 men, a six pack of balls if you will. So how'd I carry the banner......

I cut it off half way through, had run plum out of fun and didn't have the head to keep grinding. That's not to say that the course and terrain aren't fun - they are, very much so. 100 miles on it was just more than I had the fitness or the gumption for. Annie had been warned earlier in the week about the high likelihood of that scenario, so her bike made the trip up as well, and despite the extra mojo bestowed by the race plate, I pulled the plug and we swapped pedaling and kid duty and let her go out for a lap that would be more enjoyable than had I gone out for another.

However - there were a few men who rode with six packs, and who made the fun and excitement build all afternoon as they kept knocking out mile after mile.... check it out below.... it was a pretty electric scene as they finished.

Congrats to Brandon and Gordon - huge respect for those rides!

Tushar is the Crusher

Will try to be brief in saying how great I thought this race was. Burke is on to something really, really good here, and I hope he ride's the wave he created into adding another date or two next year and putting together some kind of series of these (Moab/La Sals is first to come to mind but that may be hometown bias, regardless, plenty of mountain ranges in Utah or even just across the state borders in a few directions). And if he does do more, I hope he can bring the same crew of volunteers to them, they were the stars of a knock it out of the park production that Burke put together. Type of people you wanted to stop and get to know. I'm taking tips to hand them next year - they were better and more attentive than any waitress I've ever had. The pre race buzz was exceptional with all the puzzle solving going into bike choices. I think people loved the chess match that took place before we even toed the line. I was a little late being able to commit to the race so missed out on a lot of that, and had a quick process of elimination that landed me on the Mtn bike at the line. The big post race question has been did we choose the right bikes? In hindsight, the Mtn bike was exactly the bike I needed to be on that day. Were I to line up with a little more preparation both with bike set up and conditioning, I think I'd make a few tweaks to the CX bike and give it a run, but it would have been wrong for me at this years race - I think.... see that.... you seeing the magic in this puzzle of a race course Burke's created? It's rad.

So the race started in Beaver, with Bruce setting the tone for one hell of a day with one hell of a countdown - never seen anything like it... not sure I will again without significant intoxication - it was great. I'll get brief with a few highlights from here. Felt great through the first 40 miles - the first climb went by quick, felt like I paced it right for what I had in me that day, and enjoying the heck out of racing on dirt roads up in the mountains. The day started to get long for me not far out of Circleville. Was by myself on that windy flat stretch of road, and that's where the fading started ever so slightly, then when we turned back on the dirt road, the fading began in earnest. Had felt good enough earlier in the day that I'd fueled maybe just a little light, but the time between stations had been quick enough that it was going just fine. That being said, I learned a serious lesson about bonking at last years Park City point to point, and have since been fairly attentive to catching it early if I get a little behind. By the time I got back to the intersection where we doubled back, I was needing to get some more fuel in me, not desperate, but in a less than ideal state, with nothing to correct it. I spent that stretch of pavement leading to that monster of a climb thinking about how best to approach it. By the time I hit the beginning of the dirt, I knew it needed to be a walk if it get's strenuous type of thing, I couldn't afford to rev it very high. So, about that strenuous thing.... between the pitch and the wind, I did a lot of walking, like damn near the entire thing. And it was slow walking.... I turned the music off for that section of the video to help give a good picture of what that was like... the signature climb of the race, and I was off the bike walking. Pathetic, but necessary to make sure my day extended beyond that climb. By the top I was getting a little more desperate - i'd done what was needed to keep the exertion in check, but the course had been exposed and hot for a while, and I had taken a long time to get up there. I felt some things similar to the park city lesson, and shut it down. Found the first shady spot I'd seen for a few hours, sat down, then lied down. Then I heard someone holler at me - Jon James rode by and shouted J-dub. I opened my eyes, sat up and said hi and told him he was looking strong, sat for another minute, then jumped on the bike and got moving again. Didn't think I'd been there for more than a few minutes, but John had probably saved me a lot of time by waking me from what was as best as I can tell from my race data, about a 15 minute nap. I was still in bad shape, and was fortunate that the roving support was bringing drinks back towards the KOM. Got a coke from them and proceeded to the last aid station before the home stretch.

I spent about ten minutes at the last aid, the first five piling in food, the second five catching up with Sam and Jamie, and then we were back off. Jamie made it 50 yards before he started puking. For me, the resting had worked, I'd gone from the brink of a point of no return bonk, to feeling as fresh as I had all day for that last 10 miles. Leg's were good, head was in a good place, rode with Sam whom I hadn't seen for a while so it was good to catch up with him... was just back into a real good place to enjoy the last stretch. Have never gone from so bad to so good in such a short period of time before - continuing to learn lesson's the hard way about staying ahead on the sustenance, but learning them none the less. Only hiccup of the day aside from the poor management was a random flat while rolling across those golf course like meadows - that's the origin of the tube ornament I'm wearing at for the finishing clips in the video. Shannon come by during the pit stop on her way to a 2nd place finish. A support truck also came by with Jamie sitting in front, I was heartbroken for him that he'd fought that far only to have to get in with just a few miles to go, then the truck pulled over to let him out for more hurling, and it was obvious he needed to not be trying to finish. Just as we were flipping the bike back over Joe came by. We jumped on with Joe and the three of us rode the rest of the way in. There's a little joking left in me at the end, but my favorite is Adam - you'll see him at the finish when I rolled through - I want you to pay attention to his expression when I say he's probably been there for two hours... turned out my two hour guess was within minutes of being correct, but he was too humble of a guy to affirm it. He rode a great race, along with numerous others. Also on the vid are the Zeph, Banks, and Gordon finishing up. Gordon rode the Crusher with a pretty serious shoulder separation, and get's my tough guy award for the day. Enjoy - and if you missed it, you need to make sure you don't miss the Crusher next year - it's absolutely a can't miss format and race.

Ride data - http://app.strava.com/rides/953455

Park City 50

Did the Crusher in the Tushar this weekend and my head is swimming with stuff from that race that I want to get up, but here's a quick post on the PC50 - also a fantastic race and a significant day for the White clan. Annie and I both went up to this one, and it would be the longest Mtn Bike ride she'd ever been on, not to mention it being a race, along with a whole bunch of climbing thrown in the mix - makes for quite a bit to bite off for a first go round with endurance racing.

Quick recap of my day: It was fairly uneventful. Got about what I could get from what I brought to the game that day, no mishaps, flats, or any other problems with the bike. Brief fueling deficit a bit past mid way that I recognized quick and nipped in the butt by sitting down for a few minutes and putting in what food I had, felt good the rest of the way in. It was hard, but fun.

Annie's day went a little south early on. She had two flats early in the day that required some assistance and consumed enough time that it nixed her chances at being in the mix at the front of her group. Huge thanks to Lyna Saffel and the Bike Fix crew that offered her some help - it was a less than ideal start to a hard day, and their kindness helped salvage a race that otherwise would have been really disappointing for her. But alas, it wasn't. Annie's got a head for racing - and the legs I might add - but she's very efficient in managing herself above the shoulders through the various peaks and troughs of a race. After the slow start, she got settled in, worked her way through a course that's was a little rougher and more technical than anything she's ridden more than briefly, fueled herself nearly perfectly, and finished her first endurance race. 50 miles is a long way, and covering them by riding up and down bumpy ski mountains on her mountain bike isn't a "testing the water" kind of way to do it for the first time. I'm telling ya, I think there's some significant racing in her if she keeps having fun with it - and I think she will. Here she is wrapping up her day - man I dig this chick!

Best outing yet for the Suncrest gang - everyone got er done, a feat that's evaded the group numerous times in the past. Kingdon got into a similar situation to what I got into last year on those same mountains - bonked to the point of no return early in the day - hat's off to him for grinding it out - takes a lot to do it when it gets like that. And Banks, what can I say man - think I was happier for your race than I've ever been for one of my own... way to rip it man!

Sun Valley and Sawtooths for the 4th

Headed north for a Sun Valley/City of Rocks 4th of July weekend, but ended up staying at the former once up there - too much to check out in the few days we'd allotted for it. Not the slightest bit sad that we'll have to make another trip up to get the climbing in at City of Rocks.

Few pics in reverse order of the trip....

We wrapped up the weekend in Hailey for the Independence day festivities - they make a great day of it up there. There's something about being in a small town for the 4th that I like a lot, think we may make an annual tradition of heading to a different little place every year for that weekend.

The two youngest raced their bikes just prior to the pro crit that immediately follows the parade. Here's the 4 yr old after what might be his last race on the Spiderman bike - he's outgrowing bikes about every six months it seems.

The kids favorite was the shootout show just prior to the parade - bad guys robbed the Mint building on Main St.

Rare scenes when candy wasn't being chased down and gathered during the parade. Think they outdid last years Halloween haul at this parade.

Made an excursion further up into the Sawtooth range one day. Impressive mountains, rugged....
Spent some time relaxing and paddleboarding at Redfish lake.


Spent most of the weekend in the Wood River Valley in and around Ketchum. Allison Krauss & Union Station (a band with some good banjo ranks high on my list of enjoyments), bike riding, kids first night hike, walkie talkie games in the woods - all part of a great and patriotic weekend with the family in Sun Valley and this great Country we're fortunate to live in.