I stayed in the Fargo-Moorhead area through the summer of 2005 but kept riding maybe a couple times per week but of course just out on the flat roads which was boring- basically no mountain biking anywhere near here- at the time I never knew about Maplelag (~45 mins away). I finally pulled the trigger on my entering my first mountain bike race ever in August 2005- the MNSCS Powder Monkey at Spirit Mountain. I entered the Citizen class- made it through one lap and pinch flatted- but still, I was hooked. That fall at school I got in touch with Brad Nordstrom at MSUM's Wellness Center. He helped me create an excellent base over winter 05-06 for competing in 2006, and I needed a lot of work. I had gone from a stable weight I've been most of my life of ~135 lbs in 2000 to a high of 187lbs in June of 2003 and back to 137lbs when I started with Brad. Yep 50+ lb swing!
In May of 2006 I again went to Denver, CO for the summer and raced the Mountain States Cup circuit. This is where I realized how good of a base was established working with Brad over that winter. Started in Beginner, and four races in after winning at Snowmass Village I moved up to Sport for the remainder of the season. I placed 4th at the NORBA Snowmass Village race- still the muddiest race I've ever done. I came back to MN in August for school and raced the MNSCS Powder Monkey and Singletrack Escape in St. Cloud. I took basically all of the 06-07 fall/winter/spring off of training to concentrate on my last year of school and end that with a bang- which I did. Graduated with a degree in Economics and a few award winning research and written studys. June 2007, I started my current job as a Catastrophe Modeling Specialist at Willis Re in Edina and thats been going very well.
I started racing the Buck Hill races (3 of them) on Thursdays which are really fun low pressure race events. I finally felt ready to give it a go at an MNSCS event- the Dirt Spanker at Mont Du Lac at the end of June. Finished not quite mid pack but pretty decent considering I really hadn't been riding at all. The next day on an easy recovery ride at Theodore Wirth, a little slide out on a right turn and SNAP! As I was just explaining to my friend Mat on the way home from Mont Du the day before, I was having a little trouble clipping in and out of my pedals. My bike was going one way, my body the other, an old beat up faulty pedal and completely snapped right fibula. Thanks Tom Anderson and the other guy for stopping and carrying me out of the woods and placing me in Mats car en route to North Memorial- I knew I'd meet new people while mountain biking :)
Two months later I was back on the bike- on flat pedals. I raced the last Hillside race and the Singletrack Escape ni St. Cloud. The St. Cloud race has not been very good to me- last place in '06 due to a bent derailleur hanger and 28 of 33 in age/86 of 120 overall in '07- although, its hard to count this one- racing only 2 1/2 months off a broken leg, but STILL...looking for some redemption this year!
However, while at the St. Cloud race, I saw Kyia Anderson and Jenna Zander take off so fast from the start- I mean the Expert men were fast obviously but for some reason the way those two were so close and so far ahead, even laps later, I guess it made it that much more dramatic and inspiring. I emailed Kyia and told her how fast she was and asked her for some advice :) She gave me TJ Woodruff's contact information at CTS and was the best phone call I've made. (Thanks Kyia!) The first couple months were great and was exactly what I was looking for; however, due to the purchase of a house that needed a lot of work before I moved in, I didn't have time to train much Dec thru most of April and it showed at the Spring Cup.
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