oh what a learning curve this weekend was. I decided to venture into the world of endurance racing and all though i jumped into the deep end i didn't do it with bricks tied to my feet(meaning i went for a 12 hour instead of a 24). Got up went for Breakfast at Bob's Diner in Philly with the roommate and went food shopping with little guidance as to what i was doing. grabbed a bunch of stuff i knew i could most likely stomach packed up the old Canyon with everything i thought i would need and headed off totally solo to Fredericksburgh, VA.
Upon arrival i look around and realize i am going to need more things for my pit area as it started to rain right when i hit DC. I jumped in the truck and went to the shopping at the place i loath the most the downfall of American society Wal-Mart. but hey i needed a tarp and some bungees and had no clue where the closest hardware store was.
Get back to camp and start setting up my meager little pit area. shortly after i unload the bikes and set up. not totally excited about the fact that it is raining and i have to race for 12 hours i blow up the thermarest and crawl into the bed of the truck for a little while to try and get some rest. however with an odd mix of music coming over the loud speakers and the large Diesel truck parked next to me i was getting no rest.
11:15pm its time to get my Chamios on and get ready to race. Oh by the way did i mention this race starts at midnight and goes till noon. I opt for the hardtail for the first couple of laps that way i can put down the speed in the lead group and not have to worry about fighting the slower traffic. The race opened up with a parade lap instead of a lemans style start which was nice cause i got to keep the heart rate down for a few extra minutes. i head into the wood right behind Ethan and some of the other guys from Henry's/Spot Brand/ Twin 6. I was rolling alright for about a minute when i ate it hard in a right hand off chamber turn and Amy almost ran me over. i luckily got up pretty quick without losing too much time and got on my way. The rest of the first lap was pretty uneventful save for the crazy redneck party going off on the back side of the course complete with a white trash trans-am parked in the middle of the trail blasting out really bad country and southern rock till almost dawn. it was an interesting departure from the norms of bike racing.
The laps clicked off through the night with out incident until i had the battery die on me half way through the fourth lap and had to try and ride behind people in order to see it was rather slow going till i got a little help from this random guy named Todd that hooked me up with a camping head lamp that let me ride out of the woods.
Dawn came and went and i finally went over to the scoring table to find i was one of four people on the lead lap. i had no clue i could actually do this much less be competitive. I had to try harder i decided. i had switched to my double squishy half way through the night and my back was thanking me. it let me put a little more power in and start closing down the gap on third place. at one point coming down to like eight minutes. then half way through lap 11 i just fell apart. i struggled in grabbed some food headed out in hope of closing the gap to third. it was not to be however i finished my last lap some time after noon and finally got to get off my bike for good.
at this point all i have to say it thank god for the Henry's/Spot Brand/ Twin 6 compound. Tom and the crew got me some food and lots of liquids and made sure i did not die after my solo endeavour. At this point i realized how nice it would be to have a support crew for the next time i did one of these. this was the first blog but hopefully there will be more of them.
1 comment:
good job!
even with the rain it was a great weekend for racing!
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