Yep, it’s that time of year again, Chequamegon! For those of
you who don’t know, Chequamegon is a big MTB race held in the north woods of
Wisconsin in the Chequamegon national forest. It’s a 40 mile epic of a race
which takes the racers from downtown Hayward to Telemark mountain near Cable.
It’s a national caliber race, so it’s important to show good form.
Having said that, I really wasn’t training specifically for
this race this year, which is different from other years. To really understand,
I think having a little background is helpful. I started going up to the race
at a very young age. Although my dad is not a serious racer, Chequamegon is his
chance to work towards a goal and push his limits. He would always take the
whole family, and we made a trip out of it usually taking the whole week off.
At 12 years old, I wasn’t a serious racer yet, but as a rite of passage I began
to race the short and fat. This is the race for the less intense racers, or
those under 18. I raced that until age 20, when I did my first 40, placing 99th.
That was last year, but the real point here is that since a young age, if you
are looking for me in the second week of September, I’m up north. This race
holds a special place in my heart, as it is my dad’s one big race of the year.
It is also my one big chance to show him that I respect his accomplishment of
now having raced 19 Chequamegon Fat Tire races. Needless to say, regardless of
its popularity nationally, Chequamegon is special to me for its own personal
reasons.
Coming off a somewhat disappointing weekend at LWC, I hit
the roads hard in training to improve my game for collegiate. After Monday off,
I did hill repeats on Observatory, getting 8 in before I had to call it a night
because of sunset. An easier ride on Wednesday and Short Track practice on Thursday
made it a hard week of training with races as bookends. I honestly didn’t think
about Chequamegon until Thursday when I started packing. I was treating it like
just another race. But it’s not, and I was getting nervous. I’d like to say I don’t
know what it is about that race, but I do. I explained it above. The race is
special to me, my family is there, it’s a big race, and one that is important
to my dad, my mom, and I’d like to think my sister even cares a little. So I
get nervous, every time.
After leaving late on Friday, as is customary, my sister and
I drove up to Hayward to meet my parents at the hotel. I got my number that
night, and went back to get some sleep. I woke up feeling alright, but not
amazing. My legs felt good, but I was tired. I hoped it was just being groggy.
I grabbed some food with my dad and kitted up. Knee warmers, arm warmers, base
layer, and a vest, I was dressed for a colder race. I got a little crap from my
teammates at the start, but I ended up being dressed perfectly. Speaking of
teammates, I had a whole bunch of them up there. Dave, Brian, Tim, Kevin, and
Andrew. We had a solid squad there ready to do battle, which we certainly did.
But it was nice to have people on the start to calm me down. Again, I was
pretty nervous. But having them there made it just like any other race, and I
forgot that some of the best cyclist in the Midwest, nay the world were
standing in front of me at the line. My teammates were not nearly as nervous as
I was, so it helped a lot. Also, thanks to my sister for the help at the line.
She took my warm up jacket and gave me some food and water at the line. Made me
feel super pro, THANKS SIS!
With a 4 or 5 row start, I was in a decent position to stay
up front for that start. I made a point of keeping an eye on the leader on the roll
out. My plan was simple, stay with the fastest rides you can at the start and
then hang on for dear life. I went into Rosie’s field in the top 20 or 30, and
moved up in the section to top 20 for sure. I put a lot of effort into that
first section and rode the first half to OO in the second or third group on the
trail. Around OO, I got popped and fell off the pace. I rode alone for a while
until I was slowly joined by a few riders at a time until the group swelled to
20 or so. The group had Brian in it. Tim had made his way up into the group
that I fell off of. This group worked well with each other, until we approached
Fire Tower. In the miles before the climb, the cooperation broke down, and myself
and Brian ended up pulling way too much. When we stopped pulling the group
broke down and attacks started flying. We ended up getting to the climb in a
smaller group of about 5 where Brian had been dropped. Things kind of broke
again and a few people were dropped as a younger rider from the Ripon
collegiate team, who also rides for the Vision/Wheel and Sprocket team, Ben
went off the front. He had an amazing race, and I never saw him again until the
finish. This smaller group continued and we started picking up riders from 8
miles to go on until we hit the last few climbs. We caught my teammate Tim, and
his group. This group hit the last big climb hard and we dropped the rest of my
group. We came into the bowl with a group of 5 or 6, I was riding last wheel. Coming
down the hill and into the corner I was resting my legs, and I attacked like a
mad man on the climb to the finish. I passed Tim and got the rest of the group
in a tight sprint. I need to get the picture up when I can; it is bound to be
awesome.
After all the racing, I didn’t have a great idea how I
placed. I didn’t feel too good at the beginning, but the legs came around after
a while, and I suffered home at a good pace. But my expectations weren’t high.
I was all the more astonished when I saw I placed 39th! This was
well beyond my goal of top 50, and way better than I thought I had done. It
blew my mind! To celebrate I went home and showed before heading back to party
with the rest of my team and some friends. My dad tagged along and had a good
ole time. We drank a few beers, and had some brats; perfect Wisconsin night. I
got some sleep after in prep for some Sunday Funday Action the next day. To be continued…
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