Monday, May 26, 2008

Tamarancho MTB race:

I ended up not going to CCCX on Sat. I don't know what was going on but I was not feeling myself. I'm not very forgetful, yet I had to go back to my house twice to get stuff I forgot. I was just not feeling good and sort of edgy. As I write this my stomach is not a happy camper. Maybe I ate some bad food or something? I dunno... There are 2 throw out races (of 9) for the CCCX series so it won't make a huge difference in the overall. However, I did want to race at Toro park again. Last round was hard but fun.


Expert/ 3 laps of a 5 mile loop with over a third of a lap being very technical narrow single track... Tree dodging fun big time. Sunday I was feeling better and decided to go up to Fairfax in Marin to do the Tamarancho race. This was my second ride/ first race on the Superfly.



There was no pre-riding the course so while I new it would be technical, I was going in sight unseen. Pro /Expert started together and was a undulating/ downhill fire road start--hectic for sure. Some guy piled it right in front of me. I had to stop to avoid running him over. The top 15 or so guys were in full sprint. Crap.....

The trail started to get faster and I started passing guys to move up as far as possible before the single track. Which I managed to accomplish. The switchbacks and roots provided plenty of excitement and the narrow (2 feet or less) paths necessitated using the "Force" to stay on the trail. Failure to do so, had you off the trail and down the slope of the hill.

I was moving up and passing guys . On the 2nd lap I was playing yo-yo with a friend Keith that I usually race against on the SS. I figured we could tag team and on lap 3 and have some fun. On one of the steep switchbacks I shifted to the 34T and the chain went into the wheel and jammed!!! Oh SHIT. There was hardly enough room to stand on the side of the trail to fix my bike. I ended up having to pull out the wheel and un-jam the chain.... Knowing I was in the top 10 while fixing my chain issue and losing 5 places sucked. 3 of those I made up before the end but was having a tough time afterwards as the shifting was not working to well. Later I found out I smacked the derailleur on a rock or something cuz it was scratched and the hanger was/ is bent! Probley why it over shifted into the wheel.......

I finished somewhere around the top 10. The results were all messed up and I didn't want to wait around to see if I was 10th or whatever?? I did a time of about 1:24 which was decent especially having not ridden any real technical single track at speed recently. Dispite everything, the Superfly was awesome and with a little more dialing I see some super-fun races in my future.


HR avg171/ max 186/ 3 laps-25km

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