Posts Tagged ‘Suunto t6’
I just LOOOOOve Japan. I have raced here maybe 15 times. All ITU World Cups in the 90s and early 2000s.* (Cute results from 1996 below) I love the country, the people, the culture and especially the food. It is really refreshing coming here. So much respect, honour and pride. And now, my first XTERRA Japan!
*ITU Ishigaki 1996 results (SEE! I used to be able to swim!)
Stoltz Racing’s 1st XTERRA training camp…
“It was a dark and stormy night…”
No, just kidding!
“It was a bright and sparkly morning… Six of us – all friends and family- got together for a little informal XTERRA training camp on our farm near Lydenburg, Mpumalanga. Uh, thats South Africa.
These guys are all relative newbies to sport. Sorry Gustav- rugby (even provincial rugby) is still a “game”:) Over the past few months while I was in the US I have been peppered with training questions, equipment questions, diet questions, I instructed on converting tires to tubeless and I even ferreted some Suunto t6 watches out from the US. These guys had a thirst for knowledge even the Encyclopedia Britannica couldnt quench. So once I landed on the farm they were onto me, and we had this fun impromptu training camp. It went so well, we’ll have some more in the future. (MTB camp end of Feb 09) Check www.StoltzRacing.com shortly
L to R: Gert Stoltz (aka Tarzan)- also my dad. Werner van der Merwe, Johan Pieterse, me (aka Caveman), Shelly van der Nest, Gustav Klingbiel.
I did quick bike fits, suspension tune ups, lectured on tires (a dangerous topic!) and helped one person put their
Mount Rose highway: One of my favourite long rides…
This 4hr ride starts in Reno at 1300m altitude, climbs straight up to 2700m (takes me about 1h40 at 130 heart rate) and descends straight down to Incline Village, on the shores of Lake Tahoe. (1800m)
Fill up the bottles, (penalty points awarded for time spent off the bike) and start climbing back over. About 50minutes at 130HR. Then scream down the fun side and try to keep up with cars through the many curves on the way down.
I do this ride on my own. I get a lot of thinking and soul searching done. I think about racing, training and life. But mostly about racing. Then at times I’ll switch off and numb my brain with Battery 9’s “Oom Kosie” and others…
The form is good. Quality run on the beach.
On the 7 hr drive back to Stellenbosch after Ironman South Africa, we stopped at Klein Brak river mouth so I could do my last quality run before XTERRA South Africa this weekend. The sun was setting, the sea was thundering unhappily, and Amber sat on the beach, resting her Ironman legs and poking at blisters.