Ok, so this is only a few months late...we had a baby and stuff!
In December of 2019 I entered the Leadville 100 lottery on a whim…and got in. Little did I know, that was going to be the start of over a year and a half of training, race postponements, more training, pandemics, expecting our first child, moving and a whole bunch of other stuff…
After getting the notification that I ‘won’ the lottery in January 2020 I started training. I’d never done a ride or race quite like what Leadville is all about. My plan was to do the Wilmington Whiteface (Lake Placid, NY) race which is a qualifier for Leadville. Since I was already in the race, a good performance would have moved me up in the starting grid and been some good experience for a race of that type. By all accounts, Whiteface is the qualifier that is most like the Leadville course. Needless to say pandemic happened and it got cancelled. I was still hopeful that Leadville was going to happen but not surprisingly, it too was cancelled in 2020 (along with pretty much every other amateur bike race in the world). I was able to defer into the 2020 race at the cost of a donation to one of the charities that the race supports. 2021 rolls around and my plan is the same: Tons of training and Whiteface to get my starting position moved up. Well, Whiteface again got cancelled (well moved to the fall) and Julia and I had some ‘life events’ i.e. expecting a child and moving. Needless to say I had a busy spring and summer…
