ok.. so here's the race report… in gory detail. Last night I had ridiculous sinus infection pains. I took a Tylenol sinus, and this morning, I felt pretty good, for the first time in a couple of weeks. I remained pretty good except the occasional bouts of hacking cough and wretching.
This race is cool because it attracts great talent, pros like Chris Eatough, Harlan Price, Jeff Schalk, etc. And some of the classes were qualifiers for Nationals. I raced the Marathon class. Marathon has no skill breakdowns, like sport, export, semi-pro, etc. So, pretty much everyone doing it is tough... or.. it makes me feel good to think that. The beginner race is only one lap, so no beginner is signing up for 4 hours of this. In 2002 I raced this course as a beginner. I never raced again for 3 years. Actually, I think I discuss my first race in an earlier blog.
The race results are at http://www.prologsoftware.com/proracingtiming/results/r04_27_08Final.htm
My performance was only about 50th percentile, but I'm fine with that. I mean.. damn.. everybody ahead of me has a sponsor.. that must mean your good right? Well. maybe not, but I like to think so. My goal was to get 7 laps. I got 7 laps. I pegged my performance against a guy that a couple years ago was consistently cleaning the Weds at Wakefield sport class races (last year moved to expert) and he got 9th ( I was 14th) So, here's how it went.
First.. about the course.. it was wet. Big storms the night before. Giant 1-2 foot troughs of water. Even the lake flooded over the trail and you had to ride through the edge of it. I was covered in mud head to toe. But it was fun.. and lots of real challenging climbing. This course had very few rest spots. The downhill's were so hairy and rocky and rutty, and you're riding through rushing rivers of water and mud, so it took tons of energy even going down. Wrists were hurting, back hurting. Even my thumb got cramps from shifting. I started shifting with my palms.
So, total ride time 4:43:02. Average HR 167.
Lap 1 I went somewhat hard but not enough that I felt I couldn't maintain. At times I purposely ratcheting down the effort. My seat was somewhat loose and kept tilting forward and backward. Kind of annoying.. I'll wait till the end of the lap and fix it in the feed zone. Time 33:20, Avg HR 175
Lap 2, Beginners were queued up at the start and ready to go as i began this lap. I wanted to fix my seat, but didn't want to get stuck in the sea of beginners, so I decided to do another lap with the floppy seat. I flatted, but it was a slow leak, so I manned out the lap. 34:41, HR 177
Lap 3. Took a while to fix my flat. F*cking bike store never ordered my tubeless tires like I had asked. Unbelievable how hard it was to seat these tires. Why is this happening?!? Used these crappy CO2 cartridges that I bought from an ex army ranger who used them for his guns and stored them for 10 years in his flooded basement. On them is a label, "Do not use after 2004". Smoke and sputtering sounds were coming out of the cartridges. This can't be good. Pressure was a little low.. pinch flat fodder... no time for another cartridge.. lets go. I quickly tightened my seat. Lots of beginners meddling on the trail with fresh first lap legs. I flew past dozens of them. Hey, I remember what it was like to be that guy. 45:19, HR 163. I think it was a good lap other than the time spent on the flat. Read later than Eatough flatted on his first lap and in an interview he lost 2.5 mins because of it. 2.5 mins??! Man.. i wasted almost 10.
Lap 4. As I'm rounding the corner, the sport class was lined up ready to start. This is the class I normally race. It's the largest of the classes of racers. As I rounded the corner, the announcer says, "Here is your second place rider". As I'm coming through the lane and by the racers, I can hear some murmering and at least one person saying, "hey, this guy's in second place". I don't know if he's impressed, or incredulous that the second place rider is decked out in a blue and pink super grover jersey. Anyway, it must have been a mistake.. I was nowhere near 2nd place.. who knows, maybe i was 2nd in my age category. i don't know, but it was good for the ego and for a minute I pretended I was really in second place.. ahh what a feeling. 37:37, HR 169
Lap 5 40:46 HR 166. I guess I started hurting here. Legs were pretty wiped. Real trouble on the climbs. Where's the power.
Lap 6. This lap i'll remember for a while. I started about as poorly as the previous lap. There is one really long climb. If you're not in racing shape, you cannot clean this climb, even well rested. I'm in a gaggle of about 8 people, all suffering at a snails pace. About halfway up, I overhear some conversation between racers. "At least this is the last lap," says someone. "Really?" i say. "yeah." Oh man.. there are about 5 or 6 people within sight in front of me, all suffering. F*ck. I've been suffering for nearly 4 hours. Here are five places dangling right in front of me. I gotta go for it. Now the fight begins. It's all mental.. Must crush it.. must pass them all. For whatever reason in my mind I had no doubt that I would pass every single one of these people.. I just had to strategize and start working. There's only about 15 more minutes of racetime. Suck it up..make it worthwhile. There's no way im going to saunter in seconds behind 5 other places. I started my push, and one by one they all bowed aside. They had no fight in them at all. I was surprised. Then there was one more... The downhill begins.. this is my forte. The climbs put me in my place, but on the downhill Im at least as good as the best in my class, and the guy in front of me is hurtling at light speed... he knows i'm gunning for him, and he's fighting it.. He's not relaxing for a second, pedaling at every opportunity, slamming through the mud. Nobody rides like this unless he knows he's being chased. I knew i'd get him. Right near the end there's a gravel section that has a short steep uphill. I upshifted a couple gears, stepped out of my saddle, and mashed, right by him. Once he saw me passing him it was too late. He had no fight left to continue the battle. As I passed, he loudly grumbled a congratulatory "you son of a bitch!" I think the cameraman caught the moment.
39:57 HR 169. Time may not seem to impressive, probably because I was probably on a 43-45 min pace for the first ½ of the loop. The funny thing here is now that I look back at the results, a lot of the guys I passed were already on their 7th lap, so they didn't lose any placement on account of me. Although for all of the hustling, I got the the pleasure of doing another lap.
Lap 7. Turns out I barely made the cutoff to do a seventh lap. This is a '4 hour race'. But.. if you end a lap at 3:59, you can do another lap. Placement goes by the number of laps you complete, then by the time you complete the race. As I'm coming through the timing tent, I call out, "is this it?" "You can do one more.. if you do it you'll move up a place." "at any pace" "pretty much". There was no question about it. My goal was seven laps. And here was my opportunity to achieve my goal. I was doing it. But I was dead. I spent every ounce of energy on the last lap. As luck should have it, I was the last guy to start another lap. I guess the guys behind me either didn't want to do another or didn't know the could. I kept looking back, but saw nobody. I had nothing further to prove.. this lap is just gravy. So, I treated it as a cooldown lap. On the first hill my legs were cramping. No problem.. I walked up it. Who cares. Rode nice and easy lah dee dah. Occasionally i'd come across a rider. "Marathon class?" "yea" "what lap?" "6" "cool". No competition. "Marathon class" "yeah" "what lap?" "8" "way to go!" No competition. I sauntered across the finish, making a pathetic attempt to ride a wheelie through. 50:32 HR 154.
Overall.. Fun fun fun.. but tough tough tough.. one of the hardest races ever. But very memorable. More pics once they get posted online.
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