Absent

My apologies for not showing at the awards banquet tonight. 

First of all I would be flying solo and a 5 hour two-way drive by myself tonight is not exactly what I would call fun. 

Then I would be at a awards banquet where I am recognized for my accomplishments, and although I highly value the racing community, all my friends in it and their recognition/encouragement/camaraderie, the people who I matter the most to and who matter the most to me would be missing me at home and not be able to share that moment with me, which would feel awkward. 

I love the banquets and try not to miss them.  I really wanted to be a part of it to enjoy and support the community.  I actually feel kinda bad for not going, but I just would have a hard time enjoying myself knowing I left the family at home and riding solo.  I really do feel like I am should be there, just torn with life commitments and time.

 

THANK YOU SO MUCH Darrin for picking up the prizes for me!  You are by far one of the best friends I have found in this sport and I appreciate you so much!

The Plan and lack there of!

Friel sums it up well as to why your not getting much blog action. I guess I am assuming you could care less about all the other stuff I do since this is a racing blog, but if you want more from other areas of life let it be known, otherwise deal with silence. :)

Then again Hockey will come soon enough, and I consider that racing, kinda….

Better watch out, new guy is only a few weeks old and Lindsay is setting 1 hour blue laps as an easy pace!

Here are a few more from earlier this month.

Kyle Mykul Guerra

He is amazingly well tempered, feeds well , sleeps well so far….

Born at 3:07 AM October 4th 2009

7 lbs 15 ounces

20 inches

 

Spent the weekend hanging out in a hospital room.  After Lindsay and Kyle were settled in, I went home with the girls on Sunday night, put them to bed and got my race on, since I missed WORS #11!  Hit the trainer for 1.5 hours. Built a pyramid with 1,2,3,4,5,5,4,3,2,1 minute intervals over threshold with half the intervals time in rest.  I thought that would be enough, but felt good and decided to add a 30 min. threshold ride with over threshold for 45 seconds into 30 seconds of threshold and back to 45 seconds until the last 5 minutes where I went over and above till I saw 190 BPM’s for the last couple minutes.  I have never had cramps from an interval ride until Sunday night a little while after the ride I had a crazy one that had me straight legged trying to hold onto my laptop while all sideways on the couch, trainer was as good as racing or maybe better?

Went to 2 classes out of 4 on Monday and took the day off the bike to hang with kids around the house and hang out at the hospital with family. 

Lindsay and Kyle were finally allowed to leave the hospital this morning and I took the whole day off school to help get them home and settled, but got a ride in during a little nap Kyle took.

Made my way toward Delafield and decided to do some warm-up recon for tomorrow with DB and the WETC Gangsters!

 

Thanks for reading,

Nathan

Past Weekend

Saturday

Fall Color Festival

Here is Ron threatening to punch me if I didn’t take the hole shot to be his domestique. As you can see, Ted thought this was kinda weird. Mark was getting his gloves ready cause you know he has my back. But of course the Guatemalan hiding off to the left was watching all this unfold with his mysterious sidekick behind Ron having their back at any hint of insubordination from me.

I got pretty scared with all the WETC Gangsters crowding the start line, so I made sure not to disappoint.

Once we outnumbered the Waukesha elites I gained a bit of confidence and decided to throw down instead of riding as their intimidated domestique.

As usual I think of Him and him on the podium.

Sunday

USGP and Back

Got completely SOAKED through and through, but it was awesome and plenty warm to enough to make it feel like a swimming pool with cadence!

Now off to some true west side story gangster fighting with the WETC, as me and Darrin head out to the Peak to beat each other up.

Treadfest 4TH! :)

This race was really Dynamic with tons of position changes, it made it so fun and interesting to race!

Start was fast, like jockey for position with a stampede fast. Mikey P. was definitely on FIRE and took the hole shot up the first climb and kept it pinned over the top of the ski hill into the first single track of the race. Prior to this our roadie friend Ryan Bauman tried grabbing second wheel and his fine road skills ended up giving mike a bit more room than I was comfortable with which I could have closed but with the fire power behind us of Matter, Marko, Eppen in chase I kept it steady but not full on chase. The whole time I had in mind what Mikey actually said to me at the Alterra race" I was just waiting for you to pop". And so I kept myself honest in my efforts, but just hoping Mike might give too much trying to hold onto the Win.
Half way through lap 1 Marko Bridged up and I played a major Noob move dabbing on the switchbacks twice and let Marko get by and to show me how its done as I ran up feeling dumb. This little bit of extra effort after the first lap PUNCH actually put me in trouble and I thought Marko was gonna just ride away when we came by the start finish. He had a gap going into each climb and I saw Matter and Eppen coming on in chase and I knew they were gonna catch. Going up the third climb to the top of that "mountain" I played the ease up card and latched onto the Brian X2 locomotive as I fueled and drank on this blistering day.
Lap 2 it was the four of us taking super fast lines sticking to each others wheels like glue. Lap 3 Matter hit it pretty hard on the first climb and I suffered to stay latched on to the top of the third peak and back down into the single track, but I managed.
Shortly after starting the single track here on lap #3 Eppen FULL ON NAILED a stump or rock with his left pedal directly in front of me and he was completely sideways, in the air, on a downhill section in the single track. Somehow he stayed upright, and I informed him that his bike looked like it stayed together, but very soon after he was on the ground as his bead gave way from the tire.
So I play chase, back to Matter and Marko. We were going at what seemed a comfortable pace. Going into lap 4 I was not exactly sure what lap we were on, it felt like we were out there a really long time! As we started the 1st climb I felt good and the pace did not seem as fast as I could go, so I just used the screaming super fan energy and the goods legs to see what I could do and punched it up all three climbs trying to keep it high-end while not trying to completely blow myself apart. I got a small gap on Marko and Matter but I knew it was not enough to stick. Tried one more time up the climb to the rock garden, but they were right on it again so I kept it steady through the rest of the lap to try and manage my own pain.
Going into the last lap Mikey was in sight and we were ready for battle and then I drop my chain on the steepest part of the second climb. Off the bike and get it back on, try to move as fast as we were and all momentum is gone, DANG IT! Kept it steady hoping to put in some good effort and maybe pull one of three up front back within striking distance. Then my bike starts making really funky noises and my derailleur starts sucking up and chains is going all weird directions under any hard efforts.....
At this point I started talking out loud "OH Please NO NOT NOW!" and "Cmon just make it to the end" mixed with a prayer or two for help just to finish. I started thinking about how much track was left to run my bike at this point, if it came to that, and what the time gaps were to those chasing....
Tried not to shift much, kept it in a low gear and just spun like mad. Lost two minutes on Marko in that last lap, who ended up taking the Win, congrats man! Don't know if I could have matched that, but it would have been nice to find out.
After the race I figured the noises and slight chain suck must have been just rear der. issues. I packed the bike up, got awards and celebrated with some Qdoba's.
Today I get to Wheel and Sprocket telling the guys about the race and checking out the rear Der., when my main man Derek goes "I think I might see something wrong" in a some what astonished and sarcastic voice.

 

HMMM, HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN???? I would like to assume its just raw power but cmon?!
So I am very happy with this result and it was really fun going back and forth with Mike, Marko, Matter and Eppen. Thanks to those guys for a fun ride.
Huge thanks to Lindsay, Asa, Kiley (sorry if spelling is wrong) and Charis for being the ultimate water crew and family!
Mr. Tree and Gpa Jaws both made appearances as human super soaker's, which was appreciated beyond words into the depths of my boiling over sun drenched skin.
Next up Fall Color Festival and hopefully the next time you see us it won't be 4, but 5 Guerra's all packed into the wanna be Mr. Tree Racing team car/mini-van!
Thanks for reading!

 

Photo Credit to TJ Harron, and Derek Slates

Reforestation Ramble 11th :(

Felt good on start, had lead into first single, cooled it to let someone else lead on wide open flats, where I am not too comfortable. Jesse gunned it and felt like he had rocket fuel in the legs for the next lap and a half. Guess he did since he pulled off the Win. Popped on second lap, I think mixture of last week being off sick (in lungs still) with a flat course which is not my best kind of course. Another week or two to build it back up and I should be good to go.

I popped real bad and soon saw Tristan, Melcher, Maceji, and Ted Hanes coming on and sat up to gel and hopefully recover. It was hard to hold on for a bit, but I just kept fueling and spinning it out while hanging on. Toward the end Lap Traffic got bad, like every 10 seconds calling out our presence and just praying they might move over, otherwise we comletely stop....
Tristan ended up clipping a sport rider who went endo while pulling over, I just barely missed Tristan's bike while he literally went flying a good 10 feet off the trail into the woods. I felt really bad for him since it seemed like he did a lot of the work in this quasi mtb/road race.

I closed the gap created and felt really good the last half lap and was sure I could win a group sprint. Really I should have attacked a bit earlier to try and break it up prior to a sprint because as soon as I started my sprint it came to a sudden halt due to poor course setup in my honest opinion, our whole group found the finish/lap sign right in the middle of the entrance to the finish shoot and brakes were slammed all around and that was it, the order we started the sprint in was where we ended up, Melcher, Hanes, Maceji, Me. I thought about punching it again to sneak by but lap traffic was in front and the lead into the finish was barely wide enough for two bikes???(really what is that about?) Pretty frustrating finish to go from leaders to eleventh, especially when points are valuable this time of year. Although racing here is usually not the best in results for me I was glad to ride with friends and the single track was amazing. Sorry to my fellow racers for the complaints at the line (really what do I have to complain about we are so blessed to e able to race and enjoy our competitions). I was just frustrated with the finish and my performance, it was not directed at you, not your fault at all. I did mention some suggestions for wider finish shoots for races where large groups come in to the line together.

We are in Marquette now half-way to Eagle Harbor and prbably the largest stack of intense training I have ever done to be topped off with the Copper Harbor Fat Tire Festival. Really wish I could get some pics up, but Olympus Customer Service is REALLY bad and we have been without our camera for a few weeks...

Long post, thanks for reading if ya made it this far.

So True

Friend of mine sent me a meditation for the day and this line is sooo right on!

"Happiness cannot be sought directly; it is a by-product of love and service".

Good perspective for my day as pressures of responsibility try to push in upon me. As I tend to grab and take more for my own happiness when things get hectic, I usually end in selfishness and alone with the things I had grabbed for, left empty of what really feeds my soul. "It is better to give than to receive" is not just a virtue to live by, but is actually true about the nature and the fabric of how relationships with everything in our lives have been made.

I hope these words can be living in all I do!

Other News:
Ramble this weekend and then...

Skipping first three days of school to take a long awaited, much needed, vacation in what I like to call the U.P. of U.P. Michigan.

Just so happens this is also happening!

Then back home to catch up on classes.

WOW, if I were doing Cheq. 40 I would be racing every weekend through Oct. 18th, just that one weekend off from here till then. I don't like fire roads much anyways, and I gotta learn Spanish....and I need some time away from all you lactate junkies once in a while.