Sagebrush MTB race, April 2nd

What a tough race! 21 racers in my category Expert 30-34. It was a long drive that morning, about 3 hours, the hour change really hurt, but I felt good, got there on time, waited about an hour in line to register, (sucked!) and I had an ok breakfast.

At about 10:15AM, I started my warm up, legs felt pretty good, I felt a little cold, don't know why since the weather was perfect, so I decided to race with a long sleeve jersey. Got to the start line as the Star Spangled Banner began to play and saw some friends/competition and joked a little about (we'll see how we're doing..., the race will tell if we trained this past winter or not). It was a slow start, but for some odd reason my heart rate was at around 190-195 bpm's, and I was sitting in the middle of the pack, making sure Mike (SC Velo) didn't take off on his own since he had about a 5 second gap on the group. About a mile and a half into it, I saw my brother on the side of the road. He was supposed to meet me at the top of the first paved climb, (four corners), to give me a new water bottle, but obviously, he didn't make it there in time so we switched bottles there, right before the climb began.

Well, we hit the bottom of the climb and right away I could tell the pace slowed down and I could tell we were climbing. I started to move up towards the front making sure there was no break aways, and the pace really slowed down, I felt good so I started the first break. Unfortunately, I was bridged right away, so I thought I'd slow down and sit in the group of 5 that were sitting on my wheel. BIG MISTAKE!!! As soon as I down shifted, the rider on my wheel accelerated and everyone else followed. I caught the 5th man's wheel and held that pace for about 1-2 minutes, but couldn't hold it. I was ready to pop... not good w/ less than 4 miles into a 24 mile race. I kept a good pace, but I'm sure I was about 1 minute behind the top 5 riders at four corners. Then I hit the single track and figured I'd fly down this section, but just like last year, my calves began to cramp. What the heck?!!! Only 4 miles into the race and I'm already cramping... not good. Well I spent the first half of this single track section trying to stretch out my cramps and got going again once they "kind of" went away.

Once the rollers started, short steep climbs and steep "technical" downhills started, I really picked up the pace and started picking off riders, (too bad they weren't from my category), but I was having fun and I was feeling good. Then the hike-a-bike came... yuck!!! People were passing me by the bunches! I hate the hike-a-bike sections. I'm a slow walker/runner, especially going uphills. It felt like it went on forever. But then it was over and I was back on the bike and I picked off a lot of the riders that had passed me on the hike-a-bike and some new riders. I had to block pass one rider who wouldn't let me pass after I let him know twice which line I was taking. He knew I was there, wasn't in my category and purposely got in front of me so that I couldn't pass him, so I blocked passed him, (in a safe area). He got upset and tried the same with me, but I had a lot of momentum going so his block passed backfired on him, he took the wrong line, I braked, he went too far, and I accelerated right passed him and didn't see him again. So I push the pace and get to four corners and begin the final 4 mile climb.

I started up it strong, big ringing it, hurting but feeling strong. Then I thought I'd save some energy on this long climb, down shifted, and that was another big mistake. That made me hurt more, couldn't pick up the pace and got passed by a rider in my category. I was now sitting in 7th place and I couldn't go any faster and slowly I'm seeing 6th place run away from me, and my heart rate doesn't go below 195bpm's. So finally, after what seemed like eternity, I reached the dirt, which meant downhill from here on home, so I thought...

Again, I figured I'd fly down this hill, but my cramps started again, so I spent the first few minutes trying to stretch them out as I rolled down this rocky downhill. Finally, I started feeling a little recovered and I'm off to the races again. The 2nd half of this long downhill, I was having fun again!!! Trying to make up ground I'm trying to stay off the brakes, using the awesome burms on the corners and accelerating wherever I could, and it worked! A few corners up ahead, probably about 200 yards in front was 6th place.

I hit the last climb up to four corners and I could see 6th place looking back and struggling up the climb. I was feeling good, so I pushed the big ring all the way up the climb and bridged that gap to about 50 yards. I was at four corners and 6th place was already descending down the last single track section. I started cramping again, but just fought through it, (I think I bruised because of that and it hurt like hell), but I didn't want a 7th place finish. Finally, I caught him, and rode on his wheel for about a minute. He asked if I wanted to go by, and he didn't have to ask twice. Not even two corners laters and I couldn't see him behind me. I held a fast pace pushing the big ring to the finish line and finished with a time of 2hrs and 10minutes, which was 10 minutes slower than 1st place.

Not the greatest result, but it was a good race.

SDSR

San Dimas Stage Race... what a race. 18:33 min up the 3.9mile GMR climb. I got signed up with about 5 minutes to my start time, (took somebody's place who didn't show). Anyways, I think all the excitement of getting signed up, getting my number on and making it to the start line on time, got me really accelerated. I think I took off too fast! Had a great start, felt great and when I got up to about 8:30 min, my legs started to feel that burning sensation. That's when I realized that I'd better slow down, so I down shifted, and that was it. My legs felt like they swelled up and I could barely turn over the pedals. Anyways, my time was 30 seconds faster than last year's time, so I guess it was still ok. I was now in 59th place... not too good, almost 2 minutes back from first place.

The road race didn't go too well either. Was a really cold start, but I had a good warm up so I got my legs going again after about the 2nd turn. The first lap was pretty fast, hung out towards the back for a while and started moving up on the 1st climb of the 2nd lap. I hung in the pack, about top 20 and as we're heading down to the bottom of the KOM climb, that's when things started to suck! I don't know exactly what happened, but someone later on said that there was a water bottle dropped and that's what caused it.

All I remember seeing is 2 bikes in front, a rider is skidding sideways, can't remember if he fell or not, but the rider in front of me also slammed on his brakes, skidded and totally lost it. I thought I'd try and bunny hop him, or kind of ride over one of the wheels, but it was kind of hard to do any of these when both his wheels were straight up in the air. I had my brakes on and didn't want to hit the rider down, so I endoed, hit the ground and that was it. We chased the rest of the 4 laps, but no luck. Don't even know how far back I finished.

and that was my experience in the 2006 San Dimas Stage Race...