The past two weeks have been a lot of fun. Two weekends ago
was the first race of the Collegiate MTB series for the MWCCC. One of my
teammates Skip and I made the 10 hour drive down to Kentucky for the Lindsey
Wilson college weekend. The drive was a blast! We talked the entire way down
and had a sweet rental car with some real balls, if you know what I mean. We
finally made it down around midnight or so. We both passed out immediately.
The short track race was on Saturday, which is backwards
from what I’m used to, but still cool. It rained the day before so the course
was really wet. It was all grass, and basically went up a hill, then down.
Overall the course didn’t play to my strength, it wasn’t technical enough. I
had a decent start, but missed my pedal a little and was pushed back to 6th
or so. I spent the rest of the race pulling people in an fighting for every
last spot. The roadies were just too much though, they tore up the climb and
without a technical section to help me I was in the pain cave. I ended up with
a 5th place, a little far back for what I was hoping. I figured I
need to train for the short distance more. Hopefully this will give me more
speed in the XC too.
Skip and I headed back to hotel and cleaned up, grabbed some
food and went back to watch some dual slalom racing. We watched the qualifiers
and decided that was good enough because it was hot as balls. We packed up and
headed over to the XC course and got a pre-ride in. The course was pretty
extreme, having a few really steep downhills and uphills, nothing like anything
I’d ever seen. Pre-riding was good though as I had a solid plan for the next
day. I decided that being a roadie course with so many open sections that
things would stay together. So I decided to eliminate as many people as
possible on the uncharacteristically technical open section of single track.
Then try to just beat anyone who stayed with me. We went back and made a failed
attempt to have a few drinks in a dry county. After driving around looking for
a liquor store for an hour or 2, we called it a night and got some sleep.
We woke up on Sunday morning to a light to heavy drizzle
outside. God damn it. My heart sank as soon as I saw the conditions. After a
light breakfast and packing the car we headed to the XC course about 45 minutes
away. The course wasn’t too bad, despite the rain because it was pretty sandy.
Skip and I took a quick ride along the opening section to get a feel for it. It
was still fast, but a little more technical than before. One the starting line
I was pretty focused on getting a good start in and putting the pain in early. Things
just clicked, literally. I hit my pedal on the first go, no fuss with instant engagement.
I hit it hard, making sure I was first into the woods. It was time to play my
cards and try my strategy out. I ripped the first few corners and continued to
go hard for the first half mile, and I got a huge gap! The only one able to
follow was Eric from Ripon who was struggling to get my wheel. I had some bad
luck and dropped my chain, which got stuck so bad I had to dismount. I got off
and fixed it, but lost the lead to Eric who went past. To my surprise though,
no one else was there. I had opened up a huge gap. I got back on and pushed it
to rejoin Eric, trying to keep the gap up, so break the chasers mentally. Eric
and I rode the first two laps together. He was way more confident on the descents,
and I was stronger on the climbs, we were well matched on the flats, although I
had no problem letting him pull. We actually worked together well, and I would
imagine stretched the gap more. One the end of the second lap he got a gap on
my on a downhill and I was unable to close it right away. The cracks were
starting to show, and unfortunately for me, I was breaking quicker than he was.
I got back on, but was struggling to hold his wheel. He continued to hold a
solid pace and just was so much smoother in the tech sections than I was. I
learned later that he was a downhill rider, so it made sense. But on the same
hill he got another gap and I pushed to close it, knowing I could beat him in
the sprint at the end. But I just couldn’t close it, he rode about 20 seconds
in front of me for the last few miles, and it turned into about 30 seconds by
the time we finished. I was a little disappointed in myself because I felt like
I gave in a little too easy. I was going hard, but I just didn’t push it as
deep as I know I can go. I suppose lessoned learned, and another second place
for me.
We finished up; Skip was able to pull a win out in the B’s
field and got his upgrade. I’m looking forward to having a teammate in the next
race. Overall not a bad weekend though as I turned my attention to my yearly
family expedition to Hayward, WI for the Fat Tire Festival. Thanks for reading!
No comments:
Post a Comment