Sunday, August 2, 2009

Fontana

Man, I've not raced in the mud in a long time... I've forgotten how much fun it is. Well, if you are prepared that is. I showed up to Fontana thinking that it might be muddy, and I was honestly just looking for a chance to use my spikes. After driving through the rain the entire way out there, I decided to switch out the tires before the start.

We had a 20 yard road start followed by a steep climb that everyone was saying was unridable. I even had someone tell me that it was impossible. I kinda took that as a personal challenge, and started as hard as I could to get ahead of everyone else. I cleaned the whole thing, and ended up gapping everyone by a good 30 seconds within the first mile. I rode at the front for a while until one of those damn Cycle Youth boys caught me right at the top of the climb. I started rolling down on his wheel when I cut my sidewall bad. Usually I wouldn't panic, but for some reason, it took me a solid 5 minutes to get it changed (sad, I know). By the time I got rolling again, I had been passed by my entire field, as well as the whole field behind me. Good stuff.

I killed it for the next 2.5 laps, passing almost everyone who went by while I was fixing my flat, and pulled it back for 2nd. I think I made up some time on Cory, but that was probably due to a lot more motivation on my part. The mud spikes hooked up, and I don't think I've ever ridden the mud that well. All of the downhills were completely awesome too. I love being faster on stuff like that than anyone else around me. I also seem to be coming along pretty well with my fitness. I'm looking forward to getting really fast in about a month and a half.

Oh yeah, mad props to Geoff B. for winning the SS race on a borrowed bike with the wrong size wheels. I think it was Talent's picture on the front that did it for him.

Now it's time to head out to Adventure Village to finish the trails out there for our race this fall. Should be fun. And painful. Dan is hitting the DH course for some new lines, and I think that we are going to put some new stuff in for the XC too. As long as it's not raining, it should be a good race.

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