Time?

Pretty busy riding lately. Lots of pedaling, little typing. I guess that's the way it should be. Prep for the Breck Epic is the focus right now. I never thought the day would come when WORS was secondary for me. I'm sure the results for the first few races will reflect that. Hopefully it will pay of big in July. I don't want a repeat of the 24/9 fiasco from last year. Bad post, no time, not independently wealthy, gotta work. Why can't I just retire?

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

Yet another WORS season starts. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of racing a WORS race or being at an event, it's the closest thing to a Super high end race I've been to. Not that I've done a World Cup race or anything but it's very well run. Don's on the microphone, timing is well run, results are quickly posted (at the event and online) and the race starts are on time 99% of the time. The music at the start is nice, too. Anyway, My main goal of being able to finish the race was accomplished. I wasn't sure if the body was going to let me so I was erring on the side of doing less during the race knowing that this race will hopefully be a 5 for points at the end of the year. The start was crazy as usual with my last row slot. Didn't make it to the front. Went as hard as I felt I could and had a pretty good race. Ended up 16th overall and 1oth for Cat1's. Iola is a great place to race. Lots of fun trail and plenty of room to pass. Now I just have to figure out how to stay on Melcher's wheel.
Saturday's plan is to race the 6 hour race at the Northern Kettles. New trail for me so that should be exciting.

You can't win a race at the start....

But you sure can lose it. Why is that so hard for me to figure out? With as many races as I've done and how many times it has happened to me it should be obvious. At least it was a WEMS race and not at the WORS opener. Melcher was definitely faster today anyway. The course at the Reforestation Camp was awesome and had very little mud after all the rain. It was fast and fun as the races here usually are. I apologized to my bike for not finishing as well as it deserved in it's first race. It was the rider's fault but 3rd place is ok, I guess. Of course with Lisa winning the women's field she's already one up on me. She finished up with 4 laps and came across with a few minutes to spare. Very nice. A special thanks to the rain for not showing up. Another to John Lirette for breaking his chain twice.
It was good to see some more Summer Friends at the race, too. Hibernation termination is almost complete, as it ends next weekend. Hopefully I'll have both legs working.

First race?

Hopefully the rain holds off and we have a nice day for our first MTB race of the year. We'll roll the Mothers day festivities in with the race festivities and call it a weekend. It will be nice to race on the dirt and finally sport the GT Dirt Coalition colors.

Finally

A Tuesday Night Ride with shorts and short sleeve jersey vs. arctic wear. Gotta like that. I rode to the ride and met the group en route to the La Rue Denzer La Rue race course. This course ROCKS!! I would do it and sacrifice Iola but Kylie's dance recital is at 2 pm and it wouldn't be prudent. (Thank you, Church Lady.) Mark needs help working the course anyway, so I'll do that. Back to the ride. Sam, Erik and Meat were in full effect and the pace was perfect. I tried helping Mark as much as possible and stayed back with him up Freedom Rd. He was breathing so hard I was getting a little randy, then I thought I heard and "uh-oh" between gasps. At the top I asked him about that and he did have an "uh-oh" moment. He felt pain in his chest and thought the big one was coming for a second. Turns out it was his chest complaining about all the gasping. So we kept rolling and had a great ride. I flatted in La Rue and the tire did not want to come off the rim. I was about ready to indulge in some New Glarus Coffee Stout and call it a ride when Mark succeded in ripping the tire off, and we were on our way. We managed to get the first mosquito bites out of the way, too. I'm glad to see they're back. Back to Meier's to finish up the night with food and wine. That's a great capper to a good night.

Circuit of Sauk Episode 3: The End

So it was pretty good. Saw some familiar faces like Nathan Guerra and Seth Lens, Melcher and the regulars. A beatiful day! There were 302 riders, some from Thunder Bay Ontario, Pennsylvania and other exotic locations. By exotic I mean not from Wi, like the way Zebra Mussels and the Emerald Ash borers are exotic. So the race was sweet, I followed Mark's advice and it turned out pretty ok. I achieved my goal of staying on Melcher's wheel although I added my own twist by putting him in the ditch. The first time up Golf Course Rd. I was pretty sure the Subway was on time for a stop in my mouth but it stayed down. Managed to stay on the whole race and finished somewhere in the top 10 of the Masters 1,2,3 race.
Sunday we said goodbye to the weekend guests and headed to Devils Head to do some more trail maintenance. Got all the trees cut out of the way and even added some trail! A nice technical trail between mid mountain and the top. Now it will be easier to do a loop and brush up on sketchy descents. Kylie put on another couple miles riding around the parking lot. Another A+ weekend.
Looks like maybe we'll hit up the Stump Farm race next Saturday if the rain isn't excessive. Sounds like it could be a WORS reunion up there.