Whole Athlete/Specialized Winter Training Camp (part 2)

 

Friday finally came and I was super excited! We made plans to have two different rides that day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I went on the morning ride with Dario-my coach, Zach Peterson, and Cole Avery. After the ride, we came back and went to the Whole Athlete center to eat lunch. When the riders who went on the afternoon ride came back, we all went to the team house for dinner. 

Saturday was the "official" Day 1 of camp. Those of us who were staying at the team house met the others at the Whole Athlete Center to take photos. After photos, we got the bikes ready and went out for a ride up to the top of Mt. Tam.  The climb up to the top took about 45 minutes. Once we got there, we took some more team photos. 

Then we rode down the other side and took some video. The downhills were so fun! I got to play around, catch some air, do some tail-whips and bomb the descents.

Dad came on the team ride

The views near the coast were awesome!











Once we got back, we ate lunch. Whole Foods Market supplied the food. Then we did a group yoga class and ate dinner at Taco Jane's.

I'm all the way on the left in the back of this pic.

Sunday was spent attending sponsor presentations from DNA Cycling, Osmo, and SRAM at the Whole Athlete Center and receiving all kinds of sponsor swag. Afterwards, we all cleaned up the center and met back at the team house for our last night of dinner together.

Here is the short team video that was made about our camp weekend.


WA Team Camp 2014 from Matt McCourtney on Vimeo.

My family and I spent one more day in San Francisco on Monday. We were pretty tired after a busy week, but went over to Alcatraz to check it out. EARLY Tuesday morning we flew home.

 

Overall, it was great time! I am fortunate to have the opportunity to be on an incredible team with some amazing athletes and I can't wait to represent Whole Athlete/Specialized at Mellow Johnny's in a couple of weeks!!

**Thanks to Dario and the Whole Athlete/Specialized team for some of the photos I used on the blog.**

Whole Athlete/Specialized Winter Training Camp (Part 1)

The first thing I want to say about my trip to the Whole Athlete/Specialized Team Camp is that it was a blast!! I met some great people and rode at some amazing places.

My dad and I, along with my grandparents, left for camp on Wednesday afternoon. We originally had a really early morning flight, but with the weather in Atlanta, it got cancelled the night before and my dad had to scramble to find us an alternate flight out to San Francisco. Luckily, there was one leaving Wednesday afternoon that had room for us. We had one plane change in Phoenix before getting to California. By the time we got there, it was 12 am west coast time (3 am Florida time) and I was exhausted.

Thanks to my awesome EVOC bike case, my bike made it safe and sound. I got her put back together first thing the next morning and couldn't wait to ride. Of course, camp didn't officially start until Friday, so I actually did end up having to wait one more day.

Thursday I spent with my family sight-seeing around San Francisco. We saw some beautiful beaches, woods, and views overlooking the city and the bay. It was a good time, but I was really looking forward to riding and staying at the team house the rest of the weekend.

More on that in part 2.

2014 Florida State CX Championship (1/19/14)

Last weekend was the Florida State Cyclocross Championship race in Dade City, FL. Once I arrived at the site, I put on my riding gear and got ready to do my warm-up. After 45 minutes and a lap of the course, I felt great and couldn't wait to race!

My wave included the Single-Speed and older Juniors, along with the 14 & Under racers. I lined up on the front row and prepared to sprint off the line. I was first off the start and sprinted away from everyone right away. I was catching the Single-Speed riders (who started 30 seconds before the Juniors) within the first 2 minutes.

After going all out on the first lap, my lungs felt like they were on fire from the chilly wind, so I backed it down a bit so I could recover. Two laps later, I decided to go all out for the last lap, and once I made it over the final hill and onto the flats, I sprinted to the finish line for the win.

I had a ton of fun riding the course. There were mud pits, sand pits, stairs, barriers, tight off-camber turns, hills, and a cool barn to ride through, which made it exciting. I also had a great time hanging out with my friends.

I can't think of a better way to start the 2014 year than to win the Florida State Cyclocross Championship in my age division, and I can't wait to go out to California next week for the team camp!!

Specialized Demo Day December 2013

Most of last weekend I was at Santos Trails in Ocala. It was my first real opportunity to represent my new team, Whole Athlete/Specialized. On Saturday, I woke up at 7:00, got dressed, and rode over to the main Santos trail head from my house. Right when I got out of the trails, I managed to slice my back tire and 1hr 40mins into my 2hr 45min ride, I got a flat.

Me goofing around on the jumps at the Vortex

I had already made plans to help out at the Specialized demo truck from 10 am to 3 pm, so I just waited about 30 minutes until Fred, the Specialized rep, showed up. I helped set up the pit, get out the bikes, and set up the bikes so that they could be taken out and ridden. About halfway though the demo time, I mentioned that I had a flat tire during my morning training ride. The other rep (sorry, I can't remember his name) was very cool, and he went into the trailer and gave me a brand new Specialized tire, which I was able to put on my wheel. Talk about a great sponsor! For the rest of the time, I helped out with whatever was needed, and at 3:00, I helped pack up. Thanks to the awesome Specialized reps, I was able to finish my training and ride home. Overall, I had a great time hanging out with them, and it was fun seeing everybody at Santos testing out some super cool bikes!!

True Confessions of a Slacking Blogger (Part 2)

This year, as an attempt to make training easier to schedule, my parents and I decided that homeschool would be the best option for me. Somehow, even though the purpose was to free up time during the day for training, I still seem to never have enough hours in the day. Anyway....

FSC #3

Cody, Me & Tyler on pre-ride Saturday

Before this year, the third race of the FSC has always been held at Haile's Trails in Gainesville (as long as I've been racing). This year, we were not able to race there, so GoneRiding brought the race back to Ocala at the Hardrock, a motocross park where they used to do mountain bike racing a long time ago. It was a pretty cool course, and definitely was a fitness course.

The weekend started out kind of weird. My family was in North Carolina for a wedding on Saturday, so I stayed with our friends Dave, Stephanie and Kyley for the weekend. Dave races in Cat 3, so getting to the course wasn't a problem, plus, he lives right down the street.

My parents got back into town early Sunday morning and my dad came to the course early to pre-ride. Mom came over a little later. I was really pretty excited about racing on a new track. When the whistle went off, I took the hole-shot and was first into the woods. I extended my lead significantly over the course of the first lap, and even had the fastest lap time for the whole wave of riders.

Unfortunately, I think I went out way too hard, because I bonked bad on the third lap. The rest of the guys caught me, passed me, and I just sort of soft-pedaled back to the finish. Not exactly the way I wanted to end the race and I was beginning to think my season was just not going in the right direction.

This is how I felt after 2 laps.

Tampa Riverfront CX

Lining up with Michael Danish and Ryan Woodall on Saturday for the Juniors race

The next weekend was a whole lot better! I got the opportunity to switch gears and do some cyclo-cross racing in Tampa. I had just finished building my new CX bike and was super stoked to race it.

Me leading Ryan Woodall.......briefly! LOL

On Saturday, I raced in my Juniors age group and won. Then, I raced in the Cat 4 group and blew that up, too. So, it was recommended that I apply for my Cat 3 upgrade, even though I've only done a handful of CX races ever. Also, the guys at the race suggested that I try the Pro/1/2 Open class on Sunday, just for fun. I thought that was a great idea, and so did my dad. He signed me up for it and let me race against Ryan Woodall, and some of the other pros and experts.

Sunday's race was awesome! I stayed in the top 5 for a couple of laps, but just couldn't maintain the pace for the whole 60 minutes. When Ryan Woodall came up and lapped me, I grabbed onto his wheel and rode with him for a while. I ended up finishing 8th, but had a great time.

**Thanks to Christie Burnett for pictures from FSC #3.

True Confessions of a Slacking Blogger

Me and my Mini-me

I know, I know, it's been three months since my last blog post and this officially qualifies me as a blogging slacker, or a slacking blogger, or something. There's really no excuse for it, because I actually did write things to post--I just didn't post them. So here's my attempt to set things right with a series of updates on what I've been up to.

FSC #1 and #2

The Florida mountain bike season is different from everybody else's season. For us, it starts in September and goes until the first week of December. The first two races of the series were frustrating for me, even though my results were pretty good.

Tallahassee is one race course that I love riding. I really enjoy the fast and flowing trails that you're met with when you go and ride there. When we arrived on Saturday, I helped my mom and dad unload the car and set up our pit with the First Place Racing team. Then after we got all done, I changed into my kit and set out to pre-ride the course with my friends. After we finished riding, I concluded that the trail was in great condition and I felt ready to go out and try to win the race. However, the cross-country race wasn't until the next day and I still had a time trial to do. So I made sure not to wear myself out and just sat under my canopy to wait for my turn to take off and crush it.

 

After about 1-1/2 to 2 hours of waiting, it was my turn to do the individual time trial. So I lined up and prepared to go. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, GO!!! Off I went with a really fast start, going past the fence and into the woods. Two or three minutes into the ride, I was powering over a bunch of roots when my chain fell off. I jumped off my bike, threw my chain back on, and took off again. But...no more than 10 feet later, my chain fell off AGAIN! So, I did the same thing as the first time and I continued down the trail.

 

Knowing that my dad had a time of 14:50, I tried frantically to go fast, be smooth, and brake as little as I could. Then, after looking down, right before hitting the BMX track, I saw 13:30 and thought that I had my dad beat, so I continued pushing hard and with one last attempt to beat his time, sprinted to the finish. In the end, I apparently tied my dad with a time of 14:50. However, in the final results, I was listed 16th and he was listed 17th overall, so therefore, I WON!! Also, even with the chain drops, I finished 2nd in my class, losing by only about 13 seconds to Sam Connell. It was not as bad as I thought it was going to be, but not what I wanted to get.

 

After finishing the ITT, we packed up and went to the hotel. I had a rough time sleeping that night because I was so excited about the upcoming race in the morning. Once I got to the park the next morning, I got ready to be the rabbit for the kids' 9-11 race. At 11:00, I got ready to race and set out for my warm up, making it back to the line for the 11:30 start.

 

 

Once everybody was lined up, Dave got ready to blow his whistle. Off I went. I got the hole-shot and sped through the fence. I felt great, but then at the end of the double track as we were getting ready to enter the woods, somebody had changed the tape and everybody turned left, instead of going straight. Once we all realized it, it was too late. We all turned around and we had to jump off a 4-foot drop-off to get back on the trail. This messed up the placement of the entire group. I was originally in 2nd before the course change, and got thrown back to 4th place. Cody Burnett got up to 1st, Tyler Mayer got up to 2nd, Adam Cohen got up to 3rd, and Sam Connell came in right behind me in 5th after being in the back of the group.

 

Throughout the rest of the race, I made it back up to 1st and Sam got to 2nd. We rode most of the 1st lap together until I messed up and crashed on a sugar sand turn and Sam passed and attacked me so I couldn't catch back up. I rode the rest of the first lap and the second lap alone. On lap 3, Cody caught up to me and we rode together. Half-way through the lap, Cody passed me and I rode his wheel until we reached the BMX track. We got stuck behind some people that were on the course even though they weren't racing. I took an inside line and passed Cody. I slowly started to ride away from him, but he didn't give up. He got on my wheel when we came out of the BMX track and headed for the finish. We ended up in a sprint finish, with me just barely winning to take 2nd. Sam finished first, Cody came in 3rd, Adam came in 4th, and Tyler came in 5th. It was a great weekend and I had a lot of fun!

 

FSC #2 in Fernandina Beach, on the other hand, was not nearly so fun. I got to be the rabbit for the kids race in the morning, and that was pretty much all the riding I was able to do that day. The start of the race is paced by Austin on the motorcycle for about 2/3 of a mile down the asphalt road to the entrance of the single-track. About half-way down the road, my chain broke at the master link and I was done for. It was extremely disappointing, especially after the chain issues I had the race before.

 

 

 

More to come....

 





2013 Mountain Bike Nationals Short Track Video

Here's the video from my short track race at Nationals.