NEW GLOUCESTER – For Lee Strout, 43, of Leeds, carrying a bike over a log or a rock doesn’t seem as hard as it did last year.

Nothing, really, is all that hard for Strout, who this summer had a cardiac catheterization to clear up severe blockage in two arteries leading to his heart.

“I started having chest pains in June, went to have it checked out, and found out I had both of my arteries feeding my heart blocked,” said Strout.

Blocked may have been a slight understatement. One artery was 100 percent blocked, the other was functioning at 30 percent.

“That’s what happens when you have a family history of cholesterol and ignore it,” Strout continued. “I’m happy to be back at even the level I’m at right now. I lost six weeks of riding, but eight weeks really before I could ride hard. I spent two or three weeks putzing around on the bike with my wife. It was almost like, ‘Geesh, I could get off the bike and walk this fast.'”

Strout began working out harder, slowly rebuilding his strength.

“I started riding easy, and slowly each week, I went a little bit harder, a little bit harder,” said Strout. “I called my doctor and asked her about racing. She told me she’d have to get back to me on that, but she never did, so she didn’t say no.”

Strout will join dozens of other Mainers and hundreds of cyclo-cross racers from across the country at Pineland Farms in New Gloucester this weekend for the kickoff of the 2006 Verge New England Championship Cyclo-Cross Series.

“This is one of the best races of this kind in New England, though my opinion might be biased a bit,” said Paul Weiss, 41, of Cumberland. Weiss recently stepped down as the club president of the Portland Velo Club after 10 years at the helm.

“Pineland is an incredible campus, with the touring center and all the woods,” Weiss continued. “They’ve really worked with us.”

The Portland Velo Club and the Maine Cycling Club, along with Rainbow Bicycles of Auburn, teamed up again this year to host the events over two days.

“This will be the biggest event for any cycling discipline in Maine,” said Weiss. “We’ve never had two UCI (International Cycling Union) races back to back here. We already have 450 pre-registered by (Wednesday) afternoon, so the numbers are racking up. We’re hoping to get to 600, at least.”

Sunday’s races will also crown the 2006 Maine champions in each category, from elite to juniors, though riders like Strout admit that’s not what draws them to the sport, which is a blend of criterium racing and mountain biking.

“It’s weird, the idea of hitting the pavement at those speeds (in criterium racing) doesn’t appeal to me,” said Strout, “but off road, I don’t even think about it at all. I hear these horror stories about the criteriums where all it takes is the rub of a wheel and there’s 40 guys on the pavement. Here, if you are on the ground, you’re not going anywhere near as fast.

“Even in cyclo-cross, I’m pretty close to the back of the pack,” admitted Strout. “If they had a Clydesdale class, I’d be really happy. As it is now, I go in, I hang on as long as I can.”

Racing at Pineland Farms begins Saturday, with the first race scheduled for 9 a.m. The elite men and women fields, which are expected to include some former United States and Canadian national champions, will begin their racing at 1:30 p.m.

For Strout, the weekend is less about competing – though he will certainly be trying his hardest not to finish last – and more about being outdoors in his back yard.

“I like being outside in the fall,” said Strout. “It extends my riding season, and I like to do well here because this is our home race, this is the race we put on,” said Strout.