WORS race #7 at Crystal‘Meth’ Ridge. Conditions were hot and dusty but I seemed to get things mapped out on the pre-ride the night before. I raced at crystal ridge a few times but there were some twists in store for this race.
4 laps of switchback climbs followed by a push for the very tippy most peek of the ski hill. Roughly 7/10th of a mile from bottom to top was the halfway point in the lap and of course the end of the lap included the climb from the bowl to the lodge.
On the signal of GOooooo my start went well. I was at the back half of the lead 10 in our group (30-39 yoa and single speeders), big ringed it to the single track and dumped into the wood where a little traffic helped the leaders start to gap. I’m always amazed at how fast those doods are. One bump in your game and those doods just disappear!
Make it to the switchbacks and traffic was pretty stacked. I make it to the ridge and my peeps were hollering and I felt pretty good about the tempo. I finish the push to the summit with gears to spare and I’m thinking that things may work out well. On the descent I see our series leader jumping back on his bike. I guess that he just busted out a yard sale and was re-mounting, he should of been running Hayes Brakes!!!
I’m hunkered in behind Danny Tavela and we get to the gravel road before O’Malley’s woods with this guy in tow. Out of the woods at a snails pace and I go to pull Danny while I’m able to fight off an attack to make it over the ski and down into the bowl before our second climb out of the bowl.
Photo cred: NachoBar
I felt pretty solid and led them both out back to the switchbacks and didn’t give up a pass from the chaser until ¾ of the way through the second lap. He found some good pop and I wasn’t going to try to hang on for very long. He’s consistantly faster than me so it turned out to be pretty uncontested. Adios Pork Roast.
For me the pace stayed pretty consistent. Laps were getting turned in around 25 minutes and things seemed pretty much lined up in terms of food, water and equipment. I ended up in typical ‘no-mans’ land somewhere broken up in a chase group. By lap 4 the switch back climb seemed ominous. I was looking for the normal signs faster guys looking for passes, ie waves behind us as well as the Pro’s. It never took place. I wanted to give it all that I had but by the summit I was looking to settle in to a high cadence as the legs were getting ultra twitchy.
I finished the race off chasing down super fast female elite Hayes racer Holly L with a solid time of 1:43. The low down looks sumpt’in like this.
17.56 miles raced in 1:43:00 with an average speed of 10.2 mph and a short heavily braked downhill max at 23.1 mph. I pulled an 8th in age and a 22 overall in the Comp class. Easily pegged as a pr for 2008 thus far.
Here’s a look at the switchies
Even Nic Mik-a-leaka-leky put on a good show amongst the verbal onslaughts that he got from all corners of the course.
Ata Boy!!! Now onto the next one!!!
