1st place Singlespeed open, McDowell Meltdown 2011

Just finished 1^st last weekend in the McDowell Meltdown in the highest level Single Speed category.  http://www.mbaa.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=20&Itemid=35  This is the first race in the Arizona State Championship series so I’m currently ranked the fastest XC single speeder in the Arizona series.  The Pro geared racers started first, followed by the faster Cat 1 racer categories 2 minutes later, then my category which is the fastest Single Speed class 2 minutes later, followed by the rest of the Cat 1, and Cat 2 geared and single speeders.  I ended up passing a majority of the Cat 1 geared racers and some geared Pros!   I included some images with the new bike and the decals you sent.  Good thing it wasn’t a height contest (see pic).

Last year I finished 3^rd in this same race and this year I won it by over 5 minutes on the new bike.  The Schwalbe Nobby Nic performed great on the front as did the Racing Ralph on the back!  First race on the new Trek Superfly SS, Sweeeeeet bike.  The race was on the well-known Competitive tracts at McDowell which is a high speed but technically challenging course with fast rocky sections and loose gravelly corners. 

  

Racing through the pits

Good thing it wasn't a height contest!

Ava's race training

This is my daughter Ave training for her first 24 hours race.

1st place Singlespeed at the Mcdowell 60

Just finished 1st place on a Singlespeed in the McDowell 60 which is part of the Arizona endurance series http://rockyroad5050.wordpress.com/aes-results/.  53 miles and 8000 ft of elevation gain.

I led most of the race then one block from the finish I took a wrong turn and road 3 miles in the wrong direction on a road.  I thought that a racer had passed me for first while I blew a huge lead.  I noticed that they still put me in first place so I let them know that I thought someone had passed me at the finish.

The jagged pancake sized rocks on the steep mountain climbs and descents are tough on the tires but they held up great!

Excellent race!  I was glad to win it even though I'm in my off season and just riding for fun.

1st Place Singlespeed Marathon, Dust Devil Race

Just ended up 1^st in the single speed USAC marathon category at the Dust Devil race in Phoenix AZ http://www.dcbadventures.com/ .  The 1^st place finish isn’t huge since I was the only one in my class so I raced against myself and somehow all the other single speeders ended up in the geared class.  However, overall I ended up beating all the geared Cat 1 marathon racers except one which got my by about 4 minutes so I was happy about that.  The race was 40 miles long and my finish time was right at 3 hours. 

Since it was cold and snowy in Colorado I had headed down to Phoenix to do some riding over Thanksgiving.  I was out doing a 30 mile ride and I noticed there was a race there the next day.  So in the morning I waited till it got light out and road 8 miles over to the race venue since my wife needed our only vehicle for the day.  After the race and awards I rode the 8 miles back with my swag.

Also,  I decided to apply for the USAC pro license upgrade for  Endurance/XC mountain biking after the Moab finish and just got notification that they approved it.  I don’t see how this actually changes anything I’ve been doing since I have already been racing in the highest level categories at the races but it seemed like a cool thing to have.

Mountain Bike / Bicycling Magazine article on Phil's World

Check out this article in Mountain Bike /  Bicycling Magazine.  Nice Phil's World coverage and I got a mention for helping layout and built it.  Great for the area!
http://www.bicycling.com/mountain-biking/crazy-good

2nd place SS solo, USAC National Championship 24 hours of Moab 2010

Finished 2^nd in the Solo Singlespeed USAC national championship category at the 24 Hours of Moab.  Also, had the 5^th fastest time out of all the solo categories which included all the geared bikes.  Both myself and the 1^st place finisher completed 16 laps which was a record amount of laps for the singlespeed category.  Stats: Road 26 1/2 hours without resting, 16 laps, 238.56 miles and 21,760’ of elevation gain.  Glad to have moved up from the 4^th place ranking to the 2^nd place USA Cycling national ranking.

This is an especially tough race on a singlespeed.  The gearing choice if challenging due to the wide variety of terrain so there really isn’t a happy medium.  You just have to suffer through a large portion of the course in the wrong gear.  The course has huge ledge drops and climbs, miles of bumpy uphill and downhill slickrock, lots of sand and extremely technical sections.  The Schwalbe Racing Ralph's 2.4s were perfect for this race.  They handled great in the sandy sections, gripped the slickrock and withstood the extreme abuse without any issues.  On a singlespeed the traction is even more important since we are standing up a majority of the time when climbing

Lots of press on the race although they had some incorrect lap quantities for myself and the 2^nd place geared finisher.

http://www.usacycling.org/news/user/story.php?id=5554

http://bicycling.com/blogs/mbword/2010/10/11/tostado-kirkland-win-24-hour-national-solo-titles/

http://reviews.mtbr.com/blog/josh-tostado-and-jari-kirkland-win-solo-titles-at-24-hour-mountain-bike-nationals/

http://singletrack.competitor.com/2010/10/features/tostado-defends-24-hour-title-in-moab_10736

http://uscyclingreport.com/content/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3955

http://www.ultrarob.com/blog/2010/10/24-hour-mountain-bike-national-championship-results.php

http://www.grannygear.com/realtime/public/class.php?class=1M&display_standings_flag=1

Townie Champs, 24 hours of COS

Just did the 24 hour race in Colorado Springs at the US Air Force Academy www.24hoursofcos.com.  Great course and excellent race!  Three of us raced single speed townie bikes (one guy had a 3 speed townie bike) in the 4 person geared category under the name “townie champs”.  We ended up 8^th overall and also 8^th in the 4 person geared category.  Not bad out of the over 100 racers.  Compared to the solo category I usually race in it was great to have a break in between laps.  At the awards they did bring us all up at the beginning to recognize our efforts for riding the townies all night, so that was cool.

We built my bike from used parts I found in the basement of the local bike shop with a total investment of under $200 after bolting on new fenders and converting it to a single speed.  My bike shoes retailed for more than that.  I did feel slightly bad when I was passing people decked out in sponsor gear on $5000 full suspension geared bikes with my heavy rigid townie that had fenders, a rear rack (with an emergency beer that blew up my last lap duct taped to it) and Hawaiian duds.  The fastest lap time was 1:03 which was set by the winning team which is the only person that passed me the entire race.  I had a 1:18, 1:22 (night), 1:25 (night) and 1:19 for lap times which I was happy with.

The most memorable thing that happened at this event was when we were waiting for our first rider Eddie.  Eddie had the 3-speed townie and was just getting over being sick so we were not sure about what his lap times would be but he is normally pretty fast.  I knew Eddie reasonably well having camped next to him at other events and spent most of the morning talking to him before the race.  We had been waiting for him to come in when suddenly his wife points out that his mom just rolled in from her lap at the check-in tent.  I had to ask again if I heard correctly.  It was true, Eddie’s 57 year old mom put the hurt on him!  None of us on the team knew his mom even road mountain bikes let alone was racing at the event until that moment.  That was a big surprise!

Here is a link to some pics a Colorado Springs newspaper reporter took.  I also did a TV interview, not sure if that will show up but it was cool to do.  I received more media attention at this race than when I get first riding a single speed 260 miles for 24 hours.  I may need to rethink my attire.

http://gazettephoto.mycapture.com/mycapture/enlarge.asp?image=31615663&event=1079081&CategoryID=62011

http://gazettephoto.mycapture.com/mycapture/enlarge.asp?image=31615651&event=1079081&CategoryID=62011