OK, so this post is probably not what you'd expect from the title!

Meet Miles Lee Kenny, the newest addition to the Red Pearl Racing family. He's already mastering crucial ultraracing skills - starting with "eating lots" and "staying up all night". Yep. Crazy as it seems, my brand-new grandson is actually named Miles. He arrived on June 26 at a sturdy 8 pounds, 9 ounces.

Miles lives with Dad (Thomas), Mom (Sherice) and big brother Vincent up in Oregon, so I'll get to meet him after Race Across Oregon.

After that, we've got some more mayhem on the horizon next month - but that's the subject for another post.

So far, folks are LOVING the 2015 Red Pearl Racing/Latte Warrior kit. We will be putting together another order hopefully by the end of the month. We're adding tights and (padded!) shorts to the line for the first time.

WOW! I meant to put together a RAW race recap a long time ago! I just got word that our finishers' jerseys are in the mail, which reminded me. More on RAW later - suffice it to say that we finished strong, set a class record (OK, so how many 2x, 50+, mixed-gender, recumbent bike teams are there?), and had a great time doing it.
In other news, we've been busy. We...

...represented the 'bent nation at the Graeagle Century - put that one on your bucket list, it's gorgeous! I don't think many folks out that way had seen a 'bent before, but they were happy to see us.
...put in a solid showing at Jim Kern's Valley 400k, which was a lot of fun, and included birthday cake for Bill and Graham.
...had a wonderful trip up the Oregon coast - Crescent City to Charleston and back in a weekend.
...put on the 2-Day TUC. You need to come to this one next year!!!, and...

...kicked butt at the Ring of Fire Timetrial. Bill won the 24 hour race outright with 310 miles. That doesn't sound like a lot of production for 24 hours, but - the course is DEVIOUS. Consider what it would be like to do one of the tough California double centuries - I'm talkin' Terrible Two here - at a brisk but not killer pace...around 15 hours. Then - when all of your friends are enjoying a post race dinner, you get teleported to the start line of the Tour of the Unknown Coast, and you ride that. THEN, when you finish that, you reach for your cell phone to call for a ride home. But - alas - you remember that you pulled out your phone to do a selfie up on the top of the Sisters climb, and YOU LEFT IT THERE. Now you have to ride back up to get the phone....that's about what he did. A little more than 27,000' of vertical in a day. Who says 'bents can't climb????

Spoiler alert: We're not quite done with 2014 (or maybe 2014 isn't quite done with us!). Next up: I'm racing the 508. I've crewed this race a bunch of times, but I've only raced it once, and that was FIFTEEN YEARS AGO. We are going to party - quitel

Tapering is a difficult discipline. Just sayin'. As soon as you make that conscious decision to relax, your body decides - "Hey! S/He's finally paying attention!!! Let's remind her/him about...." So - that funky place in your knee starts mentioning itself. Or your hamstrings are unexpectedly sore after a long weekend of nothing (OK, nothing but helping out with Humboldt Tri-Kids ).
We've been down this road. Not that that makes it nicer, just more predictable and less panic-inducing. Starting to get antsy to be down in Oceanside

The world seems to be flooded with infographics these days. FORTUNATELY, I stumbled upon a great one for RAAM/RAW crews to post in the pace van. Just remember: Purple = sleep break for everybody.

We wussed out on the TUC this year. The risk:reward just wasn't there close to a big race. For those of you who don't know the TUC, it's...well, it's a mainly flat ride with 9500 feet of climbing. This is an amazingly beautiful century ride, and I hate to miss it. Epic climbs and descents, neither of which happen on good pavement. Vic has often said that he should just skip the ride and put on a lottery to see who wins the fractured collarbone....
An additional factor was that the weather looked to be a reprise of Chico - cool and wet. So Team Red Pearl Racing celebrated TUC weekend by cleaning floors, carpets, windows, refrigerator, siting a greenhouse, etc - all stuff that has been radically missing from our lives for a bit too long to be comfortable, especially with another travel weekend (Davis Double) coming up.

But Jim was up for the weekend, and riding.  He reported that the TUC was, indeed, cool and wet. It wasn't actually raining at the start, but made up for it by being raining pretty much all the way over Panther Gap to Honeydew. That meant that by the time he got his first flat, he was already out of the worst of it. He also made excellent use of the pedal-braking technique described in my last post.
A lot of people shortened their ride by doing the metric (as had happened at Chico). In the remote land of the Unknown Coast, there aren't as many options to bail out or be sagged home. Jim finished out the century and arrived back in Arcata, apparently none the worse for wear - but having had a slightly longer day than he'd planned.

While he was gone, we were cooking up a little bit of fun: a BBQ and a turn of the RBB. We'd had a nice pasta feed the night before at Mary's house, and Jim handed us a half flat of strawberries. It's not quite strawberry season on the North Coast, but further south, near Hopland, is a very productive field and farm stand.

So - amazing, farm-fresh, juicy strawberries. We freeze a few and....wait. Mary is bringing the tequila, we're grilling London Broil and asparagus - and digging out our stash of limeade. It's time to see just what the RBB can do.

What, you ask, is the RBB? RBB stands for Recumbent Bike Blender. This was a once-upon-a-time project of the Healthy Communities Division (where I work) and the HSU engineering department. The goal was to make a pedal-powered blender. The kids who make it did a great job with the engineering concept, but the blender hadn't been used for a few years and the word I got from my coworkers was that it needed some help. So I brought it home and let Bill puzzle over it. Bill is crazy good with mechanical stuff, and he figured out a couple of minor things that would make it work a lot more efficiently, and did them, and hooked the whole works up to a Musashi. We'd made a couple of "easy" smoothies (yogurt, juice, and soft fruit) but we wanted to push the envelope a bit.

So - off to Margaritaville we went. Since Jim had already ridden 100 miles, we figured he was warmed up, and let him have at it. With minor adjustments (more liquid to keep the ice from jamming in the blades), we were off and blending. Here's a photo of Jim hard at work:

The RBB makes a mean strawberry margarita. We're bringing the RBB to Oceanside! Can't wait to be there!

 Another  adventure in the bag! We arrived at the Fairgrounds just after 2PM on Saturday.
I remember it being a madhouse last year, maybe because we were a bit later, and
we were trying to do a lot-  check
into a motel room, do some last-minute shopping, time everything to mesh with a
planned Latte picnic at Bidwell Park. This year we were earlier, the line was
almost nonexistent, and we were camping. We picked out a likely spot under a
tree. This was Bill’s idea, figuring that the last thing we’d want to face
Sunday afternoon after a long ride was a van that had baked in the sun. It was a
great theory.


Now,  at 3PM, we were left with essentially nothing to do but hang out. Not a problem!
I replaced my rear brake pads (yeah!). We hauled out the camp chair, read a bit,
and enjoyed the cool breeze. When it became a COLD breeze, we put on our jackets
and enjoyed that, too.


Eventually  we wandered down to the food court for dinner. We had some very good tamales,
and I decided to follow that up with some mac-n-cheesethat was really sensational. We ended up turning in at 6:30.  Really.


Somehow  the stars aligned and we both got really good sleep –except for the 5 minutes of
rain around 2AM. Up at 4:30, dress, make oatmeal and coffee, and head out to
 air up the bike tires. My rear  tire (changed yesterday – new tube/tire) was nearly flat. I was seriously
considering declaring it a slow leak, pumping it up, and soldiering on, but Bill
dove in and fixed it. (Thanks!!)


The  weather forecast was for a high approaching 70, and we knew it was going to be
just below 50 at the start, so we dressed a bit on the warm side – I had capris,
Bill had legwarmers, we both had our Team jackets. Bill had warm gloves, which
was a smart call, and he loaned me his spare armwarmers, which I initially
disdained but decided at the last minute to stuff into a side bag.



The early miles went just fine. There was a very stiff crosswind on the first big
descent (the warmup hill before heading out toward Paradise). A couple of DF
riders looked uncomfortable with it, but it wasn’t a problem for the Musashis.
Bill was kind enough to wait for me at the top of Honey Run, and we rolled into
Paradise together.


The bike path – check, then after Magalia the climb steepens to Stirling City.
Jennifer and her posse caught up to us, and challenged Bill to a bit of hill
climbing. He was kind enough to wait for me after that, too, and we rolled into
Stirling City together.


It was cold at Stirling City, so we didn’t stay long. Later
  someone said that their Garmin registered a temp of 39F. The rain started just
as we started down the slope. 



I  spent years riding in the Willamette Valley, so I know a thing or two about
riding in cold rain. And those two things are, in order of importance, if you’re
riding in 40 and rainy, (1) don’t dress for 60 and dry, and (2) don’t climb any
significant hills, because you’ll chill on the downhill. If you’ve read
carefully to this point, you’ll realize, as I did, that we were screwed on both
counts. True, we had jackets, which put us ahead of quite a few people, but –
they are,  at best, “45 and dry” jackets. Nevertheless, the hill won’t descend itself, so off we
  went. I pulled out every trick I know, including pedal-braking (pedaling with
  the brakes on) to generate a bit of body heat.


We almost made it. Actually, I think we  would’ve if I wouldn’t have gotten a second flat (front tire this time) a bit  more than halfway down. After fixing the flat, Bill was shivering visibly. When
he couldn’t control the bike, we stopped to re-evaluate. Fortunately we stopped
in front of a mini mart, and fortunately it was the sort of mini mart that sold
hot chocolate, and had free newspapers to stuff into his jersey, and had a
proprietor who figured out that it wasn’t smart to interfere with the grimy
alien creatures huddled under his heater.  For some reason, I was spared the worst
of it. I’d like to think that it was the pedal-braking.


After a bit of work on warming up, we were off to finish hurtling down the hill. We
decided to alter our ride strategy – we went straight to the lunch stop rather
than doing the loop out to Table Mountain, on the theory that one more cold
climb and descent would’ve done one or the other of us in.  As
it turned out, talking to other folks, the weather was fine at Table Mountain,
so we would’ve been okay, but – better safe than sorry. The last bit of descent
is marked at 10%+. We passed a couple of people who were so hypothermic by that
time that they were walking down the hills.


At the lunch stop, lots of people had had enough and were being sagged in. The ride
organizers had opened up the school and cranked the heat in one room so that
people could revive a bit. It was the quietest lunch stop EVER – everyone was
trying to muscle up the courage to keep going.  A bike mechanic at the rest stop spent
some time ogling my bike. The pink one always gets all the attention.



We knew we were going to keep going, but it was a question in our minds whether we
were up for the short route home, or the long route. 
Bill, who had been most affected by the cold, was thinking about bailing
out. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to.


The weather stayed pretty indifferent the rest of the way home – 60-ish and
overcast, but no real rain. And the further we went, the stronger we felt. After
a couple of dry, tailwind-assisted miles, we were rolling along at death-defying
speeds. Because we were low, and relatively quiet, and had a significant delta
on most of the other riders, we surprised a lot of folks as we zipped by. So it
wasn’t really surprising to me that when we got to the turnoff point to take the
shortcut home, Bill wanted to keep on riding, too. Woo-hoo!!!


We got back to the fairgrounds around 2, ate, showered, and headed for home. One of
my ulterior motives in leaving off Table Mountain was that 
we would have time to make a pit stop at Pumpkinland. And what can you
get at Pumpkinland? Well, let’s start with what you CAN’T get at Pumkinland. Any
guesses? That’s right, the one thing that you definitely can NOT get at
Pumpkinland  is – pumpkins. But
that’s okay - what we were there for was asparagus. They have very, very, very
good asparagus. Moist, fresh, green, not woody. They also have chocolates, ice
cream, and caramel corn. In addition to the asparagus, a bag of caramel corn got
stashed on board the Red Pearl for provisioning for the ride home.



Home  just before dark, unpacked the things that we knew we’d need on Monday, and back
to bed –so that we’d be up in time for spin class Monday morning. Whew.



I  am SO glad that I thought to put new brake pads on. I wouldn’t have had the
confidence to do so much braking if I was still working with the old, worn ones.
And in talking it over with another “survivor”, I was glad to have taken it
slowly on the descent. Jennifer did some windchill calculations – at a normal
descending speed the windchill would’ve been 30F. Her instinct had been to get
down the hill as fast as possible, to get it over with. I was tempted by the
same thought process  – that maybe I was screwing myself (and Bill, since he was staying with me) up by going too slowly, since we were exposed longer – but when we looked at the actual data,
  slow and steady is a better, safer bet if you’re underdressed.

Because you've asked....

Q) Why “Red Pearl”?
A) We decided that we really couldn't be Raven Lunatics any more. But one of the Raven Lunatic traditions we're keeping is the pirate flag, so we decided to stick with a pirate theme. The Black Pearl was Jack Sparrow's pirate ship – and when we got a red van, that was the deal-maker. 

Q) Why not RAAM?
A) C'mon, we're young and in love! A week of not, um, seeing each other is a very long time. It would be super-embarrassing to have to pull over for a conjugal visit in, say, Effingham. (Trending on Twitter: #raammeltdown #effingineffingham) When we sign up for RAAM, sometime 'waaaaay out there in the future, feel free to remind us of this. Seriously – the money and insanity commitment just wasn't there.

Q) Ummmm, young?
A) It's a state of mind. And all the old people we see are still older than us.

Q) Why RAW, then?
A) Because it's an optimal challenge for us. We're really looking forward to it, it doesn't break the bank, and we can race hard for (our super-secret goal time). We get almost all of the good scenery, and we've asked Dennis Johnson's team to send us a photo of a cornfield so we don't feel like we're missing out on the rest of it.

Q) Who's on the crew?
A) Our crew chief is Ian Hoffman. He's been through RAW, RAAM, and RAO. We've also got Phil Bradley (David's older son, also a RAAM crew vet), Jim Kern (crewing RAW and then RAAM for Dennis's team after Durango), Jennifer Johnson (Adventure's Edge), Willard Foote (retired and lovin' it), and Jan Werren (ditto). A good mix of experience and talent, with a definite Humboldt flair.

Q) Speaking of Humboldt - any sponsors besides Adventures' Edge that you'd like to mention?
A) Hey - stay out of my granola! Los Bagels generously stepped up to the plate.

Q) What have you been doing to train for RAW?
A) Besides “ride lots”, which generally works out well, we've added in some weight training, heat training in a sauna, and 24-hour interval training sessions where we take turns working hard. It was important to us to transition from riding “with” each other (which we do a lot of) to riding “for” each other.

Q) Why recumbents?
A) David made us. Seriously. Lots of good reasons to race recumbents: they're more comfortable, you can absorb the scenery better, they're safer in the unlikely event of a crash, the downhill and flat terrain can go by a little faster, you don't chap all the hide off of your sensitive parts - and you still have to worry about being sidelined by that lovin' feeling in Effingham.

Q) Why Musashis? Aren't they extinct?
A) No, they're not extinct, just out of production. The Musashi is an excellent – stellar, actually – paradigm for an ultraracing bike. It's the CAAD5 of the recumbent world: not the lightest or most exotic bike. But it's stiff, efficient, stable, and has awesome climbing geometry, which will be important for Bill.

Q) What was that, again?
A) I said, climbing geometry will be important for Bill. I suppose I'll get my share of the climbing in – but we're going to stick Bill with the epic parts. He's a fantastic climber.

Q) OK, now that we've exposed your strategy, what other secrets do you want to share?
A) We're going to pedal real fast - and play bagpipe music when we pass our main rabbits.

Q) Rabbits? Yikes! The RAW team field is stacked with talent this year! Your rabbits are...?
A) Not great fans of bagpipe music, I'll bet.

Q) One last question. Your tagline is “We're the luckiest people in the world”. Want to expand on that a bit?
A) Sure. We ARE incredibly lucky. We were lucky enough to get born to parents who were pretty fantastic at taking care of tiny, helpless people, in a country that has clean water and clean air. We were given education and opportunity to try sports from a young age. We have decent jobs that pay the bills and strong bodies that don't let us down. All that good luck got us to a point where we could become TRULY lucky: we found racing, and we found each other.

We want to acknowledge some folks who are offering support for our RAW effort.

First - Adventures' Edge is a great local bike and outdoor shop. They stock a good supply of bike paraphernalia - enough that it's an occasional lunchtime destination for me, just to make sure that I'm not missing something. They also stock Skratch nutrition, stroopwafels, Yakima racks, and have a great service department. AE gives a lot back to the community in general. They are a major sponsor of the Tour of the Unknown Coast - arguably the toughest century on the planet - and Humboldt Tri-kids. And lots of other stuff. Jennifer Johnson - owner of the shop - has even volunteered to be on our crew. How many bike shop owners are willing to take a week off in June to help out a couple of locals who are tackling a big race?

Second - Sports fans, we've got us a GRANOLA SPONSOR! Not just any ol' granola sponsor, though - an ARCATA granola sponsor. Arcata is hippie heaven, and if you're going to put yourself out as making amazing granola in Arcata, with a recipe that was handed down to you by a folk singer, no less, it'd better be good. It's actually not just good - it's RAEL good.  Oooh- did I spell that wrong? Nope. Dennis Rael is the owner of Los Bagels - another Arcata fixture. He's providing granola and treats for the adventure. He just rode up to us on a sunny Sunday morning ride and asked what he could do to help with our RAW.  Bam - just like that, we're hooked up.
BTW, if you ever get a chance to try some of daughter Trula's truffles, they're RAEL good, too.

This is what I love about Arcata - there's an amazing, vibrant community of folks who keep track of each other and help out.

The good news: the North Coast is finally getting some much-needed rain. The bad news: it's showing up just when we need to be putting out some concerted training effort....
What else to do but to haul out the stationary trainers and go for it? Since our friend and trusty crew member Jim Kern was doing a 24-hour race in Sebring, Florida (where I hear the weather was pretty danged nice, by the way!), we decided to ride for 24 hours in solidarity. (Oh - how did Jim do at the race? NOT BAD!
Solidarity, sure - just not so much solidarity that we'd committed to start at the exact same time (getting up to start pedalling at 6:30 AM East Coast time was an option, but not that GREAT of an option). We went for a more leisurely 8AM PST start, which left us plenty of time for a tasty waffle breakfast. 
Then - we traded hours for the next day. One hour on, one hour off. We will probably vary the pulls more than that during the actual race, but we figured that an hour was a good starting point.  The routine was...hop on the bike, ride hard for an hour, grab something to eat, try to get some minor around-the-house chores done, then back at it. At night, we tried to simulate a sleep "shift" - a quick bite to eat, strip off soggy clothes (our living room is considerably more humid than the Arizona desert...) and snooze for 30-40 minutes before starting over again. 
By the end of the 24 hours, we were really glad that we'd put mats down under the bikes to contain the swamp of our own making. Cog was giving us curious looks, as though we'd really, truly, finally cracked this time (or perhaps just really messed with his sleep). And I was craving bacon like mad, so while Bill did the last pull, I headed out to Wildberries and got some. We had a big ole' farmhouse breakfast before turning in for a quick nap. 

So...why didn't we just ride 12 hours straight? Wouldn't that have been harder? Yes, and no. It might have felt harder, but the point is to keep the actual speed up, not the perceived effort. And like it or not, the longer you go, the harder it gets, the more the muscles protest, and you start to slow. And after you've been off the bike, getting back, up to speed FAST is an acquired skill that we need to practice. 
And - more importantly - why did we trade off riding rather than each ride the same hour on/hour off pattern? Wouldn't it be more fun to have some company while you're suffering? Well, this is not a matter of fun. Bill and I train together ALL THE TIME, because - let's face it - we really like being together. Being a 2-person relay team means that we will NEVER be together during the race. So we have to shift our thinking a little bit. We are racing together, but - not together. When I'm on the bike, not only is Bill not on the bike, but I am racing for him. So I'd better be racing up to my full potential, 'cause I know that that's exactly what he's going to be doing for me: