It WAS fun!!!

Friday: We got to see Jubal perform at school. Some really cute songs sung by his class of little kids. As soon as he exited the stage, we grabbed him and hit the road for Davidson. We arrived at Fisher Farms Mtn bike trails shortly after 1 pm.

I had offered my services to help out with set up and the short track race on Friday, then race the 8 hr race Saturday, and the time trial and cyclocross for Sunday were up in the air.

Taylor put me to work right away which was fine. I set up some tents and walked the entire short track 2 times, once to mark the turns and once to double check.

It was great fun watching the guys duke it out in the hay field, at night!!! Jeremiah Bishop ended up taking the win.

Saturday:
We arrived early and relaxed. We had set up our Liberty Bikes tent the previous night, so mainly we just showed up , had some coffee and waited for the start. I got to listen to part of the Bike Rumor interview with the pros.

Then the race started. In the past I have gone out way too fast, and burned up before I would have if I had taken a more steady pace. This time I didn't go out way too fast, but, I think that if I had slowed down just a little it would have made a difference overall.

Laps 1-3 were very muddy and slippery. After that the single track was fairly smooth and fast but the roots stayed slippery most of the time. Laps 4-6 I was feeling good but feeling tired. I stopped after # 6 for a pbj and Red Bull, it didn't give me wings but it helped pick me up a little bit. Lap 7 was slower and I kept it steady. I came in put my lights on and went out for lap 8. It was 6:30pm and I figured that if I went slow enough, I would not make the cut off and not have to go out for another lap.

My goals were to do 8 laps and finish feeling good.

I made it back to the start finish at 7:28 pm, 2 minutes before the cut off. Arrgh. Now I had to decide. Since I was not feeling really good, just kind of so so, I decided to stop while I was feeling good. I had learned some more about myself and my needs ( thanks to help from Namrita O'Dea) and that was more valuable to me that completing another lap and running myself into the ground!!!

So stopped, got cleaned up and waited for Jeremiah Bishop and Harlan Price to finish. They had stayed together for the entire 8 hrs, and were still going strong. They only lapped me about 8 times. One time they lapped me, I decided to stay with them, that lasted about 10 seconds!!!!

Jeremiah took the win with Harlan taking 2nd, only 12 seconds back. That was a great race.

I ended up in 16th place and was glad that I didn't go out, because it would have only bumped me up to 15th, if I had put in a fast time.

Sunday:

We showed up early to help out with some clean up and to get ready for the TT and Cyclocross races.
It turned out that Taylor did not need me during the races so I got changed and ready to go.

The time trial was 4 miles of single track. I forgot to check the results to see how I did, but I gave it what I had. I did get passed by the guy who started 2 mins behind me.

The cyclocross race was painful but fun. 30 minutes plus one lap on a 3/4 mile course. I had no idea where I was in the field or who was in my category, actually I was not even sure what category I had entered!! So, I went all out, I think I did 5 laps. 3 laps I felt great, but then I slowed way down and got passed by one guy in the end. I didn't check the results, and folks kept telling me "good job" and " wow, you had a great race", and I'm thinking " Really? thanks".

We headed back up to pack our stuff up, help with clean up and then to the awards ceremony. I always like to hang around and cheer on my fellow competitors at the awards ceremony, even if I didn't win.

So, we are sitting there, clapping and cheering, playing with Jubal etc, they call my name!!!! 3rd place in the Open Men's cyclocross!!!! Oh yeah!!!! I didn't even know until now!!!!!

Wow, what a great weekend, great people, great organizers, great venue.

Have a great day.

(I'll post pictures tomorrow)