About a year ago my buddy Cynthia swore she and I would ride as a coed team in the FC50 in 2008. Thinking she would forget all about it I felt pretty safe entertaining that thought. As much as I hoped she would forget, she did not; a few months back she reminded. Damn! So I really started hitting it hard. Much harder than the Kokopelli. I knew all I had to do was go as hard as I could for 25 miles and Cynthia would do the rest. Sounds easy until you consider that 25 miles included 5400 feet of elevation gain and a course I've never ridden. Doh!
Cynthia really wanted me to do the first lap so I could experience the rush of the crowd. What a rush it was! Such a rush that as the race started (toward the end of Main St), I looked at my heart rate and it was racing at 178! I was barely pedaling and nearing my zone 4. Probably nerves, but I couldn't get my heart rate under control for almost an hour. The entire climb up Boreas Pass road, my HR stayed around 184. During this time, I am pedaling like crazy in my big ring and getting passed by way too many riders. I see a couple riders with 23 written on their leg (my group) and unfortunately I couldn't do a damn thing about it. My HR is sky-rocketing and I was getting passed by more riders than I was passing. Very deflating. It wasn't until the first downhill section that my spirits lifted and I started catching a ton of people. I consider my technical/downhill to be right up there with some of the best, so this was a welcome site for me. Some pretty gnarly stuff and pretty crazy to see so many people blowing up all around me. I must have seen 30 people wreck, picking themselves up, and or changing flat tires. What an
awesome feeling to shoot gaps of people turning into complete yard sales. At the half way point, all I did was picked people off. Not sure if anyone else passed from this point on so I must have really picked it up. I started feeling so much better about everything. Wish I could have found this pace in the beginning. Toward the middle/end, I really found my legs and gave it everything I had. I didn't want to have anything left in the tank when I was done. The last 5 miles was pretty much all down hill, so I picked off close to 25 riders. Tons of riders were lost (due to flipping over their bars) on the super steep singletrack that was littered with switchbacks.
Here's a shot of me sprinting like mad across the finish line. Cynthia's boyfriend Dave was right there.
Thanks Dave! To the right is my partner, all bloody and full of dirt. She is one tough chick! We ended up finishing 12th out of 27 teams in the coed sport class. I suppose that's not bad when you consider we're racing against some top riders and we finished in the upper middle of those top riders. Our combined time was 5:45:04. Cynthia keeps telling me that's good, but I don't believe her.
To sum things up, I felt like I road at a brutal pace, riding mostly in my middle and upper chainring. I am not sure if I could have done anything different other than pre-riding the course and somehow managing my nerves better. Ridding myself of nerves shouldn't be too hard in the future as now I know what to expect. I stayed vertical the whole time (had only 3 "oh shit" moments) and did not stop for anything. Road straight through the entire thing as hard as I could. For my first race ever, I picked one of the toughest out there. Where do I go from here? I not only plan on riding this again next year with Cynthia, but I plan on shaving 30 min off my time. I will not rest until we earn a spot on the podium. :-)
Normally I wouldn't blog anything about such an ordinary ride, but this was a very extraordinary experience. I decided to step up the level of difficulty and not allow myself the option of using my granny gear for the entire ride. Going middle chainring the whole way would be something pretty cool to take home.
Well, I not only pulled it off, but it wasn't that bad. I road the entire figure 8 (minus "the wall") in my middle. Those who have ridden know what the figure 8 is all about. The nasty-ass little climb (right before the wall) that most people walk... middle chainring. The climb to Red Mesa loop... middle chainring. The stupid steep doubletrack up the other side... middle! The entire thing, start to finish, was ridden in my middle. Must have been the sleeve of cinnamon rolls I ate the day of. LOL! Now that I've knocked out Buffalo Creek and Deer Creek in my middle, I suppose Mt. Falcon is next on my list. Boyeah!
