Sorry about the lack of posting, I've been at the biggest event in North American mountain biking: The Sea Otter Classic. I'll give the full race report in a little while, but right now I'm a little fried from the twenty hour drive (straight through from Monterey to Colorado Springs), not to mention the full week of riding, racing, and generally seeing the sights.
Briefly, we arrived at Laguna Seca on Wednesday evening, where I set up my tent and crashed after an epic drive. The next day I wandered the venue, checking out the vendors/exhibitors, which included anyone and everyone remotely connected to bikes. My roommate Jane and I also pre-rode the XC course. Friday I raced in the Open Women's Short Track, which was about 25 minutes of dying on a bicycle. I got 13th out of 20 (on Friday the 13th!), having put forth a good effort. Saturday it poured buckets, and I retreated to nearby Salinas to dry out my things after my tent started raining on the inside. Yikes. But, by that night I was all dried out and ready for the next morning's cross country race.
The expert women lined up on the Laguna Seca Raceway itself, and at the whistle, our cross country mountain bike race took off on the famous pavement. Now, I think road racing is downright scary, and this experience didn't change my opinion. I was surrounded by a pack of women all jostling for place while hauling the mail down the asphalt. Lots of dodgy corners and unpredictable brake-grabbing happened before we were able to get on the dirt and into our proper element. I was feeling pretty strong (as strong as I could feel while wheezing myself to death racing in April), when chink! my cassette ate my chain. A few choice curse words, and a lot of lost minutes later I was back on the bike, racing along with the Men's Sport class riders , who had started behind us. Well, I certainly didn't break any records, but I sure showed some Sport riders how sand is meant to be ridden! All told, I managed to not DFL even with my trail repairs, finishing the roughly 19-mile course in about 1:58 minutes, 26th out of 28 competitors.
OK, I'm going to unpack, pedal a little, and pass out. Night all!
Monday, April 16, 2007
Back from the Sea Otter
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2 comments:
that sure sounds like you had a good time. and here i thought you were just being lazy about not updating your blog. so sorry. anywho, keep up the good work, and ride on.
No shit. I can't believe we missed each other. Well actually, of course we did -- there must've been about a million people there. Good times. I hear ya about the start of the XC race -- I did sport and it was the same story. That's not what road racing is like though! It's what racing on the road with a bunch of mountain bikers on mountain bikes is like! Road racing is rad :)
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