It’s been awhile since I’ve updated you on my blog. This fall has been full of travel and adventure for me. Our company Potential Energy Training and Nutrition has started to take off so this has been keeping me busy in addition to the commissioned paintings I have also been doing (you can see my portfolio here). My business partner, Tricia and I were joking one day how starting our own business did not yield extra free time - it just meant we were always responsible for what we were doing with our time:)

My Cape Epic partner, Debra Doss had me do a piece inspired from our race. This is 3ft x 4ft oil on canvas.

I have had such an awesome year, taking a leap by quitting my salaried job, starting a new business and now supporting our family through two things I am so passionate about – cycling coaching and art!

Racing has also continued to go really well for me as I finished 3rd at Xterra nationals in Ogden, Utah in my age category and qualified for Worlds. After that race, I took a much needed break, and traveled to Northern California with our athletes (and great friends) Jason and Jennifer Hanson to help crew for their 24 HR Mountain bike world championship race. During our all-night drive north, I was somehow inspired or I might call ‘peer pressured’ into signing up for my first 24 hour solo race, the 24 Hours in the Ol Pueblo. I did this at about 12:03am, right after their registration had opened. I figured I coached enough 24 hour solo races, I should go feel the pain myself! Crazy! So, as you might guess, since then I have been putting in some serious endurance miles on the bike.

A New cycling adventure will take me to Nepal in March. Photo Credits: Sanjog Parajuli - endurenepalfilm.com

This next year also has a new cycling adventure for me that will take me to Nepal in March, with my mountain bike and a group of amazing ladies (my business partners Tricia Davis and Julie Cornelius, Regina Jefferies (pro enduro racer), and Kjersti Christensen (pro downhill racer), to ride from Kathmandu to the remote region of Langtang that was wiped out from the earthquakes. This isn’t a race. We are going to ride 100 miles and 23,000ft of climbing up a mountain (on the Rocky Mountain Sherpa bike) to help in the rebuilding efforts – working with a group called “Seeds of Life” to build a stone greenhouse that will provide food and economic support to that area. We are also filming the entire process with talented producers Sarah Li (of Fazed Pictures) and Carolyn Wells (her documentaries have been featured in National Geographic, Discovery, Channel 4, NOVA, Netflix and the BBC). It will be a feature film called “Endure Nepal” that will be submitted to several film festivals next fall!

We will be riding the Rocky Mountain Sherpa equipped with Blackburn Design packs in Nepal.  The growing mountain bike community in Nepal is very excited to see these bikes for the first time when we arrive! — We will be riding the Rocky Mountain Sherpa equipped with Blackburn Design packs in Nepal. The growing mountain bike community in Nepal is very excited to see these bikes for the first time when we arrive!

This is a project my business partner, Julie started in June and is now all coming together. We have several amazing sponsors on board and are raising money through our Kickstarter campaign. This has been a lot of work for all of us but we are very excited about this journey. We hope it will show the positive impacts of female mountain bikers, impact the Nepalese community, and promote tourism in the region.

Our producer Sarah spent this past month in Nepal doing some filming and meeting with many organizations such as the Seeds of Life, rebuilding committees, and the Nepal tourism board. She has some incredible blog posts on this project and how we will be impacting the community - so check it out!

Our producer Sarah Li for Endure Nepal Film meets with the Seeds of Life Organization on our  rebuilding project.  www.endurenepalfilm.com — Our producer Sarah Li for Endure Nepal Film meets with the Seeds of Life Organization on our rebuilding project. www.endurenepalfilm.com

This is the Arizona Trail near Superior, AZ.  The finishing section of the AZT 300. — This is the Arizona Trail near Superior, AZ. The finishing section of the AZT 300.

After our Nepal adventure in March, I figure that I’ll be in incredible bike-packing shape, so, I am planning to do the Arizona Trail 300. This is a trail that runs from Mexico to Utah. The 300 is just the southern portion of the trail. I have my friends Jennifer, and Shelby Hanson who asked me to join them in this challenge. Already, we have ridden several sections of the AZT and I can already say, it's one of the most beautiful places in Arizona! It's rugged, remote, and beautiful. I would have the option to ride this solo and be super competitive but I feel that sometimes its more important to share these types of journeys with good friends.

This is the kind of shenanigans you'll find on the Arizona Trail!

Outside of racing for 24 Hours solo in February, making a film in Nepal in March, and riding halfway across Arizona in April, my pro season really starts at the end of April with the Whiskey 50. I will do some early local races in January and February, but the big pro fields are at the Epic Rides events. They offer challenging endurance course with a huge payout (equal prize money to women!) and lots of fans. They are also endurance races so for this year, that really fits with my strengths. These races usually take over the downtown area and create a festival atmosphere that gets the locals excited. They also have a race in Grand Junction and Carson City that I am planning to do too. In addition, I am competing in the Xterra races again with bigger goals so I’ll be actually training a lot harder for the running and swimming. I’d like to go to Worlds in Maui and get on the podium (that’s in November). I am also planning to do a 100 mile mountain bike race in Bend Oregon in July, the 70 mile mtn bike race in Laramie (Laramie Enduro) and then I am signed up for the Leadville Lottery and plan to do that race in August. There are a few other races I'd love to do like the Moab Rocks stage race but we'll see how the season goes! It will be a big season but I’m excited for the challenge!

I have had some amazing sponsors over the years and one in particular has pretty much sponsored me since I started racing pro on the road – Kenda Tire. They again are going to be my official tire sponsor for my 2016 season! I had such a great 2015 season on the Honey Badger tires as they held up to the extreme conditions at the Cape Epic in South Africa and all of the other races and endless hours of training I did last season. So, if you need a strong tire that hooks up – the Honey Badger is my tire of choice (at least for AZ)!

These Kenda Tires got me through some epic terrain at the Absa Cape Epic this past year!

My other sponsors, Osprey Packs and Swiftwick have been a tremendous help with our Endure Nepal film and will be supporting us in that big venture. Osprey is supplying our packs for the trip and Swiftwick is helping us with our Kickstarter campaign! You can get yourself a pair of my favorite socks by contributing to the Endure Nepal Film Kickstarter campaign!

Hope your Holidays are wonderful and I look forward to sharing my new adventures with you in 2016!