Lumberjack 100 CBD TEAM Success - I've never been to Marquette, Now I have, my thoughts - New Strength Routine - Get my BEST updates delivered to your inbox.

Lumberjack 100 CBD TEAM Success - I've never been to Marquette, Now I have, my thoughts - New Strength Routine

Jul 15, 2022 7:35 pm

Hey Fellow Cyclists!

I still have not personally raced the bike since the Fort, and I have no plans right now to do so. The Whiskey scarred me and I am not sure if and when I'll race again. BUT, I still love riding my bike, and I have two amazing bike experiences to share.

First, as some know, my friend Jason has been battling Pancreatic Cancer for some time now and as a team we thought we should tackle the LumberJack100! This was an amazing experience to witness him pushing his body yet again despite the odds through 100 miles of off road bliss. The icing on the cake was for him and Brent to win the tandem division. Check out the videos below, one is the almost full race, the other is the story of the race in the Come Race with Us version.

Almost Full Lumberjack race

Short Story Version of the Lumberjack race

I am also coaching coyotes again this season, I love to help and watch them progress through the season, I do miss my Blue group from last year as some have moved on to college this up coming year.

Just another reminder that I have a new website, bikelifewithrob.com. It has the same stuff that the old website had, but the name just makes more sense. We will no longer be using ur bike life . com! Check out the new website, let me know what you think and if you see any mistakes!

If you have not heard, I started a podcast and it seems to be going well. I am enjoying the interview process and again the focus is on athletes. Unpacking the Athlete has published 5 episodes, and you can listen to them on most podcast platforms including Spotify and Apple Podcasts, just search for Unpacking the Athlete. You can follow on social media to know when new episodes come out, or you can also subscribe to alerts in your podcasting platform. Unpacking the Athlete is on all of these social media platforms; Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Again, just search for Unpacking the Athlete. My next guest would out run anybody, and no it's not Forrest Gump!

Marquette. Wow. I have never been there in the summer for mountain biking. I would find myself thinking I was in North Carolina, or in the mountains of Colorado but would quickly remember that I was in the UP. I went with my family and my buddy Rob and his wife. We stayed at Rippling River which I would highly recommend!! Cloudy days you can relax in the hot tub, sunny days you can cool off in the pool!

Saturday on the way up I rode in Ludington for 35 miles to wake the legs back up as I had not been doing much riding at all the previous week. Sunday we made our way into Munising and stopped at our fellow Coyotes place so the kids could hang out while we hit the Munising Bay Trail Network as recommended by them, thank you Hughes! This place is fun right now, they are building more trail as we speak, and will surely be a place to stop on your way up to Marquette with all of it's elevation, singletrack, flow trail, and jump lines. We did a quick 10 miles and 1000 feet of climbing.

Monday was rainy, but in the UP you can ride the trails anyway. This was my first taste so we stuck to the South Trails and tried to stay off the slippery rock trails. Wet Bridges were the sketchiest thing we encountered on this day. I still can't believe how it feels like you are in the mountains. Even with the rain, we hit some fun trails like Eeh Line and Smiley, which kept me smiling with the precipitation coming down. We finished this day with 25 miles and over 3000 feet of climbing.

Tuesday was suppose to be cloudy in the morning and sunny the rest of the day, but the sun didn't come out and the sky just misted all day long. We made the decision to again stay off the rockier trails and headed to the North Marquette trails which are very familiar to me due to all the fat bike riding I've done there in the snow. These trails are super fun in the rain as well, and we even tackled Wildcat while it was wet!!! We finished this day off with just over 33 miles and north of 2200 feet of climbing. I then set off on another 10 mile ride and 750 feet of climbing on the south trails with my lovely wife.

Wednesday, started cloudy but the sun popped out and Rob and I spent almost 6 hours riding the bikes up by Harlow lake on the trails there. This was the sketchiest day of riding out of everything with some walking in sections. We also got lost plenty of times because it is hard to follow where the trail goes on the rock. With RR and Megan rides combined, I was over 52 miles and around 4400 feet of climbing.

Thursday's weather looked great, so we met up with our buddy Tyler to ride the Epic Loop on the trails near Ispheming. These trails are pretty cool and offer some serious gnar as well, and we were happy we decided to wait to ride these after the trails dried out. I actually went down a pretty steep rock slab without hesitation, and if I would have seen it first, I would not have done it!! The trails over in this area are epic for sure! We hit about 52 miles and 3700 feet of climbing.

Friday was spent back riding some of the rockier south trails, and RR snagged all the KOM's on Zuegs trail, and Tyler joined us again for the ride. I finished the day off with another ride with Megan for a total of around 31 miles and 3500 feet of climbing.

Saturday morning the wife and I were up and did another ride on the south trails together which included Zuegs, I need 2 more runs down to piece some sections together and I think i'll be able to put in a good run! We put another 17 miles in with over 2200 feet of climbing in.

Later Saturday I rode Valley Spur on a somewhat under inflated tire, hit a lip, did a whip, and crashed OTB on the left shoulder pretty good as the front tire rolled, still sore today. That ride added 14 miles and 800 feet. This trail feels like Mosquito Creek and the less climby side of the Dragon trail for those wondering.

Sunday I woke up and the shoulder was really sore, but I had to get another ride in on Brunos Run Trail with the wife. Every bump hurt, but the views were well worth it! 13 miles and 600 feet! If you have not been to this trail, I would recommend it because of the beauty of it, every corner you come around offers a lake or stream!!

With all of this riding, we put in hours of hiking on top of that and basketball with my son as well. I think the week was around 300 miles and 25,000 feet of climbing! This week I have started strength training back up, but have only had the time for one ride. These videos will gradually come out, I did not anticipate all of the videos to mix in with each other, so I have a pretty big sorting task ahead of me! I cannot wait to get back up to the UP to ride again, I absolutely fell in love with it up there. Not only can you breathe in these mountain because of the low elevation, they get more daylight than we do down here in the summer!

As far as strength, I am using dumbbells and Kettlebells for 6-8 reps in a very slow controlled to failure single set. I try to make the set last 60-80 seconds and the muscles are totally spent. This is saving me time and I will see strength gains in the coming weeks. I am using the PowerBlock Dumbbells as they allow me to go from a really low weight, all the way up to 90 pounds a dumbbell. As stated before, I always start my strength workouts with a dynamic warm up which includes walkouts, a variety of different lunges, leg swings, arm swings, and a few other things. You need to get the blood flowing, the muscles warmed up, and more of your muscle recruited for a safer experience. If you do not feel warmed up properly, or you are over 40 years old, do 10 minutes of cardio before the dynamic exercises to get it right.

Strength Exercise List:

Bench Single Leg Squats x 6-8 reps

Bench single leg hip ups x 6-8 reps

chin-ups x 6-8 reps

Dumb Bell press x 6-8 reps

Single arm rows x 6-8 reps

knee to elbow planks to bicycle flies to kneeling opposites

The 2 ab exercises are all done in a row without stopping along with the kneeling opposites. As I move through this workout, I make sure to increase the weight when possible! Remember, you should change your strength routine up every 6-8 weeks for maximum benefit!

Body work is going on major!! When I do perform it, this is what it looks like. Body work involves different things from static stretching later in the day after workouts, to the massage chair, to a foam roller, to a handheld rolling pin, and my favorite the gun! You know the new device everyone has, that hypervolt. I don't have one of those, but I do has a jig saw and you can buy all the attachments for under $20 here. I also do dynamic stretching before hard workouts to get the blood flowing better and more muscle fibers recruited to reduce the risk of injury. I have been keeping my Yoga practices on Wednesday's. As you also may have seen, I have added the Air Relax recovery boots to any post race and post hard workout recovery.

If you like YouTube, be sure you are subscribed to the Youtube channel so you don't miss all the epic MTB action! If you are stuck inside, find one of my longer fat or XC racing videos to watch will you train indoors. Check out some of the new videos below!

Podcasts: