Welcome to the pro fat tire crit the men's field at the epic rides whiskey off road.
This is the 50 mile race at the do, but they always have a fat tire crit.
We've done one of these before at the same exact race.
And we, these fat tire crits are shortly after I had the same bike that you
ride in the long back country, 50 mile race, but you can change the tires
were on board with Keegan Swinson.
How's it going?
Keegan.
Oh, good.
How you doing?
Good.
So you're from the Santa Cruz hit squad.
So you are on which.
I'm racing,
the blur in the tr set up so that the mindset,
it means longer travel.
And that was for the back country race.
And I seen, we just had it locked out for this race.
Yeah,
actually, um, it's funny you say that.
Cause I was, uh, I was down in testing labs with Tobin earlier in the day
and actually found that we were unlocking our bikes on the descent.
Um, and dropping the post.
So we were using like opening that suspension and dropping the post for this.
You're going to see it here.
It was really fast right-hand turn and it seemed like the bike handle better.
We could go faster with a bike open.
So we just had aired up the suspension a lot more.
Like I ran probably 40 PSI more in the fork and like 50 PSI more in the shock.
And, uh, and then we just lock it up.
Basically after this turn, there's one more bright Hender down here and
then I would lock it back out again.
Interesting.
So this race started at the very beginning.
There you started off with 760 Watts for the first 30 seconds with Ryan Standish.
A friend of trainer rode up in front there.
So 760 Watts for a third of first 30 seconds of a race.
Isn't typically how most people start to race Keegan.
That's typically too hard.
Why did you start that harder?
Is that just par for the course?
Just the way these go, uh, at least definitely race, more like
a short track and they do a crit.
So you kinda have to start hard to get your position.
Otherwise everyone's just going to blow past your means.
You saw like Ryan pulled ahead pretty quickly and had like,
I'd not done 700 Watts, then you would have sort of been swarmed.
And I think.
It's nice to try and stay somewhat near the front, these races.
It's just where it's safe.
And especially I knew that fast right-hand turn coming up rather quickly.
You want to stay kind of the front of the
back?
No doubt.
So let's talk about the course a bit.
Uh, it's about a kilometer long about 0.6, six miles has 86 feet
of gain or feet of elevation gain or 26 meters of gain per lap.
Uh, and on this one, what elevation are you roughly at, at this.
Um, I think we're at
right around 5,000 feet in town of Prescott.
Give or take maybe 55.
So what somewhere around like 1800 meters, I reckon I could be totally off on that.
I apologize.
I won't say it's probably 1200 meters.
You're trying to stay at your, you're making a calculated
choice to stay toward the.
And maybe be in the wind, but you're doing it to save energy because going in
the back, you could use even more energy just to trying to respond all the time.
You could miss moves and then also it's dangerous.
And the main goal is the big race coming up after this.
Uh, okay.
So let's scroll ahead and let's see, uh, how things start to unfold
once we get close to a pre-me lab so that when you came across the
line there, they just said pre.
Um, what are you were riders chasing prims in this, and is that
a concern of yours that they're going to get away on a pre-me lap?
And how are you managing that since you're trying to police the front?
Um, yeah, I mean, the pre-labs always go pretty hard.
I mean, there's always someone that wants to go for the praying.
Sometimes I want to go with the premium, but you gotta be a
little bit smart as like there's still a fair bit of racing left.
And also in the back of my mind, you're still thinking
about the race tomorrow, right?
The back country race have.
Kind of that you can't go full out the whole time.
Otherwise you just blow yourself up, especially at altitude.
Um, so you can see these guys are kind of going for here trying to get in position.
And
then
my thought was,
yeah, I was still a bit hard to try and get the back of the bunch.
I was like, if they go for the Preme and then someone attacks, at least I'm in a
good position to follow that attack or a counter attack, the prenup, it sits
up and it gets really easy for a bit.
So I think you kind of have to be.
Can of just watch it and the prenups, you don't necessarily have to go for
the premium or to be set up for success.
You have to be just kind of sitting on the back of the bunch and just make
sure, like, I wouldn't want to Russell, Todd and Taylor to all of a sudden have
like a gap and then just roll away.
Right.
Those guys are strong enough that they could easily hold the field off,
especially on a course like this I've also, and I have done it in the past
pace and, um, you just roll off the front and then you kinda, it's kinda gone.
So I think you need to just pay attention and watch the bunch
and kind of be ready to frame.
That's right
here.
You thinking you're going to counter attack them or just sit in and be
ready for somebody else to do that.
I was just sitting there like, wait the shadow.
So sorry, but there he goes, Todd Wells, he's doing it.
Yeah.
Todd was going, so I was like, if someone doesn't do it, then the guy will, and
you just gotta have to be ready for it.
And, um, can you ready to follow?
So Todd went forward and I just was able to kind of jump on his wheel and make sure
he didn't get too much into too far ahead.
So it sounds like your goal is your goal isn't to initiate.
You don't want to initiate a split earlier on in this race.
You want to just police it, ride with anything that does indeed go up the
road, but not be the one to instigate.
Yeah, exactly.
Uh, for me, this race, I was kind of just waiting for the last lap or two, and I
was gonna kind of see how it shook out.
I think with the way that the fat tire crit being the night before
the back country, I think everyone seems like they race it a touch more
conservatively than they used to before.
I'd definitely be willing to risk a little more and go on like a long, long attack,
but that uses a lot more energy than it does, like sitting in the bunch and then
just like sending it with a couple to go.
I think, uh, yeah, it's definitely changed how it seems like how a lot of us
race it.
So nothing's going on that last lap.
So that probably means everybody's tired.
Is that what you're gleaning from that?
Nothing is going on the second to last lap
to go.
Yeah, it was kind of thinking that also there was, it was like, I think
it might've been just me, but I didn't hear, I didn't see the lap count
and I assumed it was two laps to go.
And I was like, well, at this point, I'll just kind of wait for the double.
I'll wait for the bell and make sure.
Um, that was, I was pretty confident that we were going into the last lap this time.
Um, so you can see them on the front here, because if, basically going into
the last lap, if you're not within the top, I don't know of course like this,
if you're not in the top 10, top five, even it's hard, like the pace gets so
strung out and so fast that it's hard to then like make up places or attack.
Does that make sense?
Um, so I think it's worth a little bit of energy to make sure that the
front top three is ideal seal that someone looks like a Jeff Kubota.
Jeff slot in to, he knows he gets this the first time you've seen Jeff Hall race.
So he knows that you got to get to the front of the last lap because it's
going to go full gas up that climb.
So I was kind of happy to let Jeff with Jeff lead here and he showed us
this nice, cool line in the gutter.
Yeah, it was just going to say, look at Jeff, how he's riding in the cement
because it's going to be less rolling resistance than going on the app.
Yeah,
it made a big difference too.
I use that you'll you will soon see
he's a savvy racer.
He knows what he's doing.
He is.
He's one of the savviest.
There are, um, that's for sure.
Okay.
So now you're coming into the last lap.
Are you already planning on attacking this lap?
No matter what anybody
else does.
Yeah, I was planning going all in up this climb and that's where the race is won or
lost.
So 900 Watts out of the turn.
And then you're going to snap any snapping.
You hit 14, 17.
How much do you weigh Keegan?
And
I have a hundred and a hundred forty six hundred forty eight pounds.
Jeez.
So that means, so with this attack, you had a 14, 17 max, and then for
30 seconds, or for 20 seconds, you had 1017 Watts was your average.
And then for seven or for one minute, you did 700 Watts in the last lap.
How important is this little climb here?
Cause I noticed that a lot of the time you actually surged as much, if not more on
this climb than you did on the climate.
I think that one's pretty underrated.
Um, that climb is when you come and do with a fair amount of momentum,
when you're like, when you're ribbon, like I was right there, but you still
have to punch it to get over it.
I think a lot of people, you can blow your wallet on that first climb and not have
much left for that, that little puncher.
So I think you have to remember that that's there and you
can't fully empty the tank.
You've just saved us a little bit to be able to hit over that climb and.
And then roll this to the finish.
Even this is a slight uphill grade, uh, before this left-hand turn and it
takes a bit out of, yes, you have to.
I was trying to get as arrows I could hear.
And obviously I usually get the gutter like Jeff and then set up and.
Still as kind of protect the protect the inside of it.
So no one could come up inside me.
And,
um, yeah, there we go.
And we don't have a back camera on, but spoiler alert that attack
destroyed them and you had a gap, so yeah, way to go Keegan expressive.
When were you worried about this?
Because you hadn't really done much intensity coming in.
Yeah.
I mean, I also, wasn't quite sure what to expect.
Uh, I've just been doing a bunch of like higher volume training for
the races that I've been doing and with on down, coming up and whatnot.
So that said, I have been doing a lot of sh I mean, branch to the shoot
out here in Tucson every weekend.
And it has, it finishes with pretty much a one minute full gas effort, as well as
a sprint at the very end of the shootout.
I was like pretty confident I still have some kick, but I wasn't quite
sure how the body would respond after repeated a laptop to climb.
So yeah, well done worked
crushed it.
And then you ended up winning the back country race too,
with a big margin, uh, Keegan.
Where can people follow you and check in with everything that's going on
with you in the Santa Cruz hit squad,
uh, over on Instagram at a key goes nine nine, try and keep it
up to date and keep you guys in the loop as to what's going on.
Awesome.
Thanks Keegan.
Yeah.
Thank you.