Monday, May 05, 2008

Dirt Sweat and Disaster

The weekend didn't go so well. Drove a long way to "race" for 2 hrs. Pre-rode the course on Friday and loved it. Rolling, witha few steep but short hills. Twisty singletrack was very nice. By raceday it was terrible. Made a bad tire choice and paid for it. Was running fifth into the woods, feeling like I was riding easy instead of all out off the start like normal. The trail was wet, but not too bad. 4 miles in it fell apart. We came out of the singletrack onto a dirt road. I was running a 2.3 tire up front. I had also taken my rigid fork ( the one with miles of mud clearance ) off and replaced it with my suspension fork. Bad mistake. My front wheel got so clogged with mud that I couldn't even push the bike more than 10 feet without it stopping me. I had to carry my bike for the next six miles to finish the lap. At one point I had cleaned enough mud out to roll and I got on for a downhill. I made it 20 feet and the front wheel clogged so bad that it stopped and I went over the bars. Broke my derailleur hanger on that one. Was planning on trying to change tires and get something going on lap 2 till that nonsense. I was about to be lapped on my first lap when I finally got out of the woods and back to the pit area. Packed it in and went home.
Injury report: A good cut on my left knee ( slipped while walking w/ the bike)
A long cut on my right shin ( caught my fender in the endo!? )
A pretty nasty disc brake rotor burn on my right shoulder.

The drive home was long to say the least. I HATE quitting. Anyways, after that display of dominance I am no longer placed high enough in the USAC Ultraendurance series to justify traveling to the rest of the series. Therefore, my schedule will change a bit from here on out.
Stay tuned for the rest of the season. DH