Havasu + Move to Colorado!

February and March have been a few pretty awesome months! Quite a bit has happened, including a camp, a race, and a move. Just a few weeks after Tritonman, fellow EMJ Teammate Conrad Sanders and I drove up to Las Vegas for Team EMJ camp. It was 110% first class.

Highlights of camp in list form so that you can truly appreciate how epic it was:
- Staying in the Las Vegas Mini Castles (Connor McGregor rents them when he's in Vegas)
- Bathrooms stocked with EMJ Products - save 25% using the code EMANTELL17 at checkout! go to everymanjack.com
- Riding red rocks, 70.3 silverman course, running to Arizona, swimming at Henderson Multigen pool (in our matching kits/roka suits)
- Meeting everyone on the team - so many people from all over the country (and Canada) came out, and everyone was very welcoming - just an all around great group of guys!
- Food - Donna Trauger is amazing, kept us full even in the toughest of times! And breakfast burritos at the pool were clutch
- How organized and smooth everything was (S/O Ritch and everyone who helped with that)
- Saturday night party bus to the strip
- Getting the gear from Every Man Jack, Garneau, Roka, Sockguy, Lululemon, BoCo, GU - made me feel like the division 1 athlete that I never was ;)
- Pictures by Talbot Cox! And videos too... Seriously, just watch these videos and then you'll get an idea of how much fun we had :)

Check out his instagram here

After an awesome weekend in Vegas, we headed back to Arizona. Since I can't seem to stay away from Tucson, I made trips down there every weekend, including an 8 day camp over spring break where I crashed on Conrads' couch. It was great to say goodbye to Mt. Lemmon (for now), ride the shootout a few times, and just enjoy the Dirty T! While it may be a little bit ghetto, the bike infrastructure is significantly more built up than Phoenix, and the people are much more friendly towards cyclists.

With a lot of training done, it was time to head to Havasu for the MCTC Conference Championships. The field was very similar to Pumpkinman, with Dan Feeney, Nick Noone (EMJ), Timmy Winslow, Josh Fowler, and Conrad Sanders (EMJ) all in the mix. One of the nice parts about being in our conference (MCTC) is that it's relatively stacked. With the defending national champs CU in the mix, it's hard to not get excited.

I packed the car the week before Havasu, in anticipation of not wanting to move for a few days after...

it was a good decision

The swim didn't get off to a smooth start. Originally, the plan was to line up front left, but a dock was definitely in the way of that, and swimming headfirst into a wood structure didn't seem very fun. Instead I lined up in the middle second row, right behind the CU train (Dan, Nick, Timmy), hoping to grab some feet. Probably the worst idea ever... If any of you were ever put into a washing machine by older siblings as a child, this is very similar to what it felt like being in the middle of 50 people trying to move their arms as fast as possible. Looking back, and after a talk with my coach Elliot, I have now realized that the second row is farther from the finish line than the first, therefore I should line up at the front in order to be closer to the finish line. Live and learn, and while I still probably would have gotten dropped hard like usual, I tell myself that with proper positioning at the start, the deficit would have been slightly less than 1 minute - it helps me sleep at night ;)

sucks that you can't use paddles in a race

After a not-so-smooth transition where I almost forgot to put on my shoes, I hopped on the bike. Dan, Nick, and Timmy had all come out of the water together, and were going to be working together to put a gap on the field. I knew that the time to catch them was limited, and that if I was going to catch them it needed to be quick. After trying to bridge up in the first neighborhood, they still held around a minute gap on me. By the far end turnaround, I realized that I was not going to catch them. The gap was around 1:20, and I was beginning to feel the effects of chasing for around 25 minutes. While my legs didn't feel great, I tried to remind myself that you don't need to feel good to go fast. After shedding a few tears, I tried to be as smooth and aero as possible heading back in to town. Some post race strava over-analysis shows that I actually made up 10-15 seconds there! Yay! Coming into transition, I could see them all running out together about 1:20-30 up. Even though it was a lonely ride, I'm still glad I went as hard as I did. No ragrets.

No race pics again, so I had to improvise

When they tell you that Nick and Timmy came out of the water with Dan and you realize you're screwed

After another meh transition, I headed out on to the deceivingly tough run course. The first mile involved zig zagging a wheelchair ramp and climbing up some stairs. I found my rhythm about a quarter of the way in I settled in, and started ticking off pretty well. The on-the-spot race plan was to build in to the run, and if I smelled blood to go for it. At the turnaround, there was no sign of any fading from the CU train. They were all pretty far ahead, and unless someone completely imploded there was no way I would catch any of them. I tried to pick up the pace for a little bit heading back in, but that effort was short lived. One of the highlights on the run course was when Conrad yelled SEND IT at me. I got pretty pumped up and almost started laughing actually. Watch this video to figure out why. At the end of the day, I realized that I could have probably gone a little bit faster if I had been focusing on myself as opposed to everyone in front of me.

Nevertheless, I still went hard, am happy with the result, and am fired up to race again at Collegiate Nationals in April! Hats off to Dan, Nick, and Timmy for showing everyone how to throw down. You guys crushed it.

After the race, we went to chipotle, froyo, and then froyo again. It was pretty lit. This week, my mom came down to Arizona to help with the move to Fort Collins, Colorado. It was a tough decision to leave Tempe during the spring, and I'll miss everyone there. But... To put it simply, Fort Collins is freaking awesome, and passing up the opportunity to move here would have been silly. If you have any questions about Colorado or want to come train here/experience unlimited froyo at TCBY in the summer hit me up, because exercising and eating are fun.

Hangin at Lynn's place aftter Havasu! She's the best