Buenas,

This week in San Martin de los Andes has been an awesome week of rest, training and the time honored tradition of having the locals show off their home trails.  I’ve had a sweet cabin all to myself and the opportunity to catch up on sleep and emails.  Every day consists of a lazy morning drinking coffee and communicating with the world, then some bike training in the morning, a group ride in the afternoon and home made cooking in the evening. Yesterday I did a great workout and rode up to the base of the ski area called Chapelco.  There was a dusting of snow on the top of the mountain.  I did two 20 minute sub-lactate threshold intervals with the Kings of Leon in my ears for motivation.  In the afternoon, I did a 2nd workout with the local riders during siesta.  It was a mixture of ages from 15 to 45 and a huge variety of downhill and XC bikes from brands I have never heard of to carbon Enduros. The ride was a complete maze of cow tracks, hand built jump trails and dirt roads.  There is a complex network of trails here that are shared by the cyclist, the local Mapuche, horses and hikers.  It seems to work pretty well.  It’s sort of like the streets in the town.  There are no stop signs, stop lights or any sort of traffic controlling measures.  However, the flow seems to work and everyone just moves fluidly around each other in cars, on bikes, on horseback and on foot.  I have not seen one altercation yet.  It’s the mellow South American vibe, I guess.

The other day also included a trip to the local fire station to check out their equipment, say hello and see how the emergency services function here.  The fire community is a family just like cycling.  You can go anywhere in the world and have an instant connection due to a shared passion.

This weekend I went to Chile for a marathon mountain bike race around the volcano in Osorno.  It seems every town has their local volcano. There were supposed to be a bunch of riders from San Martin heading over there, but the weather forecast was for high winds, rain and 40 degree F temps. Most people bailed, but my coach put this on the training schedule so I begged a ride from some locals and went for a good dose of suffering. I figure that’s why I’m over here anyway, so I might as well get in as much training as possible. We drove for 5 hrs, stayed in the Bates Motel, stood in the rain for 3 hrs, then they cancelled the race! To top it off our normal 5 hour drive home took 8, as we were stopped at the border for no apparent reason. It wasn’t a total loss though as I did plenty of EMT studying in the car. It’s a good thing I’m doing all of this riding because this area is famous for three of my favorite things:  red wine, beef and chocolate!

Reba

The adventure of the Trans Andes stage race has come to a close. Jenny has left to head back to Colorado and I have been chilling in a cozy cabin in San Martin de los Andes with the Specialized dealer and his friends.  The damp stench is finally washed out of my clothes and sleeping bag [...]

In the words of Jenny Smith,
Stage Five of the Trans Andes challenge was held today in Huilo Huilo national reserve. The stage was shortened and changed from the original route because of the weather and difficulty of the riding. It was a good idea to change it as we woke to rain and started in [...]