AKA Sea Slaughter lived it to its name this year for me. I had a happy gung-ho time then slaughtered in the end.
The setup was the 09 Giant Anthem X tricked with the brand new WTB Wolverine 1.95 rubber. Thanks to the guys at Northstar-at-Tahoe I was able to ride this tricked rig.
The super d went real well. Basically the same course as the last few year except even smoother and a more ridiculous start. For some reason I have real good luck with the goofy starts. Bikes turned around and upside down with us 30 yards away with our heads on the start line paint and shiny spandex butts in the air. Got on the bike and got off to 5th. Then there was a group of seven up the first climb where I grabbed Carl Decker's wheel and got a little gap on everyone else. Carl started pulling away and the guys behind me started catchin up. Battled it out to a 3rd! Eight seconds behind first and half second behind second place.
Short Track was pretty sick. Lining up with the world champion, world cup champion, like 5 national champions, and three Olympians was a real shocker. It was the guys I read about and dream about that I'm racing.....crap, this is going to hurt. Seventy-four racers on a tiny congested 1/2 mile loop only brings insanity, in a good way. I got a mid pack start and from the start just went all out for as long as I could, the race is only 20 minutes, or so anyway. After several laps all I could do is hold on with everything I had and got pulled somewhat near the end. I wrangled a 28th and was pretty stoked with that. The race went pretty smooth except pro's don't move....for anything. I was known as the aggressive short track racer now I'm the grunt being pushed into fence poles at high speeds.
And the slaughter. Cross country with somewhere near 120 racers aiming for a 2 foot wide piece of trail. So after the start on Laguna Secca Raceway where everyone rode like toddlers making careless moves and taking people out, seriously pile up after pile up, we filed down to the trail. Probably in there around 50th. Did I mention it hot?...real hot. They shortened the race from 38 miles to 27 due to the heat and people were still dropping out like flies, unfortunately I was the fly hit by the windshield of a big rig clinging to life. Then I crashed on some loose sand and kept on going then went to clean the beach out of my mouth and to my pleasure my bottle was gone....awesome. So continuing on without enough saliva to spit I soon faded away to see John Bennet robbing the aid station for water after his crash. So we rode together to the venue and called it a day.
All in all it was a good week with a lot of learning and some descent results with my first big pro podium. Now to do some well needed rest and some high school racing till I decide what I want to do next.
http://www.cyclingnews.com/mtb/2009/apr09/seaotter09/?id=results/seaotter092
Photos:
1. Skinsuit's are rad!!!!
2. Super D podium
3. Super D start
No comments:
Post a Comment