I had every intention of not participating in this event, but I decided to sign up at the last minute. My youngest son (8) really has taken a great liking to mountain biking and we had recently done 2 short rides in the Franklin Mountains. He always talks about doing the "Puzzler" without really fully understanding the distance and difficulty of the course. I had not intended to repeat the nuttiness of last year but then I heard they for the first time added a 10 mile "fun course" and this sounded like something I could attempt. Mind you, I have not trained on the mountain bike at all since last years puzzler, but how hard could it be to do 10 miles? Well its pretty hard, but fun at the same time. Here are my impressions of the event in 2012. More can be read at
http://www.elpasopuzzler.com/
I went to the Bowen Round House on Saturday and picked up the race packet and number. Paid for a 1 day race license and checked out the course. Sunday AM, drove out with the kids and their bikes in tow. I wanted to get a chance to ride around the course around Bowen ranch after the racers had taken off as I knew they would not be back for several hours. Signed in at the roster and rode up Mad Cow with the boys to warm up. They had a nice campground fire for us and we watched the 50 mile and 35 mile racers take off. The 10 mile fun riders were last to take off about 10 minutes later.
Of the 175 racers that participated in this year's race, there were 20 racers in the 10 mile category and we took off at a pretty good clip North on Pipeline road. This jeep trail is rocky and has some up hill sections that got the juices going early. Next we turned at the water tank towards the Franklin Mountain State park and again more uphill until Sotol Forest. Last year we turned South along Sotol but now there is a new section (more about that later) of Sotol which goes North for more climbing. The trail was really nicely layed out and the surface was packed by recent precipitation we have had. I decided that this was going to be a "fun ride" and so I took my time to enjoy the scenery and take pictures.
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| Top of only hill in 10 mile Fun Ride of Puzzler |
After reaching the top of the hill, the descent was a little technical but manageable or so I thought. I was constantly worried about falling and had some close calls along the way until this point. Mountain biking really requires complete concentration, which makes it such a great distraction. However, throughout I could not stop thinking, " What am I doing here?" "I have not been training for this type of event" and the inevitable "I am too old for this!" And so it was that I can up on a tricky turn downhill that I fell and flew of my bike landing on my back on top of some type of desert vegetation right on my back and but. I did an instant assessment and figured out I had not broken anything and got up. I was greatful to have landed on a plant and not a rock.
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| Plant I landed on top of, actually quite soft despite appearance |
The rest of the way was uneventful and I reached pipeline road again, happy to be back to the jeep trails back to the ranch. At this point, I got to meet Robert Newman who was cheering all the racers. I had known about his trail building contributions and wanted to meet him and thank him for all he has done. Last year he was instrumental in building the Hitt Canyon trail and this year, he and volunteers from the Borderland Mountain Bike Association
http://bmba.wordpress.com/ completed the Sotol Forest extension just a few days before the race. I told Mr Newman how much I appreciated his hard work over the years. I told him when my 8 year old was old enough to ride these trails, I wanted to let him know I met the person who had a great hand in building them. We talked about how my son likes to build trails in the empty lot across from my house and he shared with me that when he was a boy in the 1940's living in Northeast Texas he started building trails in the nearby woods.
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Robert Newman, Mountain Bike trail builder
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The way back to Bowen Round House was the rocky jeep trail which was largely downhill with some slight inclines. On the way back we passed by the Windmill, which is a historical landmark of the Bowen Ranch. The ranch is located on the Old Salt Trail, which was used to transport livestock through the Franklin Mountains to the Salt Flats near Carlbad, NM., using the Anthony Gap which was known as "rustler's gap" back then.
After 7.5 miles, it was back to the Bowen Round House for some gatorade and then down Lazy Cow for another mile and then back along Pipeline back to the ranch to complete a 10 mile loop. My total time was 1:32:33 officially. I scanned the results on Tuesday after the race and to my surprise found out I was 2nd out of 17 finishers with 3 DNFs in the 10 mile category.
I think as always the race directors, David Wilson and Brent Sanders did a great job with the Puzzler race this year. I think the 10 mile course is a nice addition to get more people interested and get motivated to train for the longer events. I think a Kid's race would be a good addition along Lazy cow after all the 10 milers are back as there is plenty of "downtime" before the riders come back to the ranch. So now its on to the El Paso Half Marathon on Feb 5 and then Mt. Taylor Quadrathlon Feb 18 in Grants, NM, after that event I will have my next post.
