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January 2010 Team Santa Fe Activities
RACES:
El Paso Puzzler Mountain Bike Race
Franklin Mountains State Park
Jan, 17th, 2010, El Paso, TX
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc
ExazFnZzBKYlE&hl=en
Jan Bear 1st Cat 1 men 50+, 6:06, 19th overall
By Jan Bear
I decided to do this race again this year as last years event was really great. Also I had a
new bike that I wanted test in a race environment. Mike McCalla drove down with me; it
was great to get some race advice from a real mountain bike expert. We drove to Las
Cruces, stayed overnight as it was only a 35 minute drive to the Bowen Ranch starting
area. It was a mass start with about 90 riders primarily from Texas and New Mexico that
did the 50 mile race, the 35 mile riders started 5 minutes later. The route was 50 miles
and proved to be rocky and challenging. It was well marked and took you into arroyos,
river beds, and canyons. There were two big climbs one over Mundy Gap; thru a boulder
scree field; yes I fell again and then the second on some new single-track about 15 miles
north in the Franklin Mountains. The fun part was having different checkpoints where
stickers were placed on your racer number making it spell out the race name "Puzzler".
The first loop was 11 miles long with about 75% being single track, then the big middle
loop; 35 mikes was lots of climbing and single track with the usual desert flora(everything
is sharp). The final short 5 mile loop was great single-track but I was pretty slow thru this
part as I was running out of steam. By the end you had covered all different types of
terrain, sand, rough gravel roads, tight single-track, sharp rocks, cactus, hike a bike and
more.
Thank you to Team Santa Fe Sponsors: Litespeed, BTI, Bike & Sport, ThorLo, GoLite,
Gaerne, Camelbak, Montrail, Leki, Niterider, Dermatone, CW-X, Princeton Tec, SofSole,
Shain, Polar, Hydropel, Outdoor Research, Suunto, Polar HRM, Maxxis, E-Caps, Wingnut
Gear, Potable Aqua and Bolle.
P. F. Chang's Rock 'n" Roll ½ Marathon
Tempe, AZ
Jan, 17th, 2010
http://www.rnraz.com/home.htm
Kim, JJ and Samantha Bear 2:45:43
By Kim Bear
This was the second year for the Bear girls to run the Arizona Rock 'n' Roll ½ Marathon.
With both daughters in college, it was a great way to end their winter break before they
went back. This year we were more prepared for the more than 35,000 entrants starting
from the registration in the convention center, to waiting 30 minutes to cross the start line.
We saved our give away warm clothes and stayed warm all the way to the start. The race
has a great feature of being able to donate clothes to a charity, so you can just leave your
extra garments anywhere and they will picked up. Our time was slower this year because
we ended up with long waits at the Porta-potties. However, we felt like we ran faster when
we were running. There were people/runners everywhere. It did make it fun to know that
we would not be last. The girls and I enjoyed the bands every mile, sight seeing as we
ran through Tempe and especially running at sea level. We have placed this event on our
annual calendar.
Thank you to all the Team Santa Fe Sponsors: Litespeed, BTI, Bike & Sport, ThorLo,
GoLite, Gaerne, Camelbak, Montrail, Leki, Niterider, Dermatone, CW-X, Princeton Tec,
SofSole, Shain, Polar, Hydropel, Outdoor Research, Suunto, Polar HRM, Maxxis, E-
Caps, Wingnut Gear, Potable Aqua and Bolle.
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