Tuesday, February 24, 2009

24 Hours in the Old Pueblo Race Report (2/13-2/15)

As I'm so far behind on blogging, I'm going to just hit the highlights of this race. I had spectated/volunteered last year while Erik & his team did this. Last year was cold, snowy and quite muddy. My car looked like a brick.

This year's weather looked to be slightly more promising, only producing cold with no snow or mud. Awesome. So onward:
  • Liane asks if I want to be a on a team. I tentatively accept.
  • I ride it my first time with Erik in Nov, takes about 2:45 and I fell once. Not terrible - and I didn't do the last His & Her's trail part.
  • I ride it with Liane, Heather & Nicole. We get rained on. Takes about 2:40 for that.
  • I go with Erik and friends and try to lead the slow group, I fail. I leave the group behind - suckers! I do 1 full loop and a half loop. The full loop I did in 2:20 and I stopped frequently in hopes those behind me would catch up.
  • No night riding - I did all that training at FI.
The race:
  • Arrive on Friday and set up camp by Elaine and Zac.
  • Start to get cold.
  • Commiserate with Elaine & Liane over the lateness of Nate and fire
  • Eventually Nate shows up, everyone rejoices
  • I enjoy a brat from the food vendors with a little too much horseradish mustard. Sinuses = CLEAR!
  • Hang out around fire
  • To bed early as it'll be the last good sleep I get for a bit
  • Slept in
  • Made it to the pre-race meeting where Todd reminded us to play nice. Crunchy....
  • Watched Heather be our lead rider
  • Elke went 2nd
  • Liane went 3rd
  • I contemplated the amount of daylight I would get
  • I head out with about an hour of light. Sweet!
  • Made it to the arch before turning on my light
  • Some dude mooched off my light on the stupid climb
  • Sweet downhill and my first lap was done! (1:58)
  • Heather goes out, some dumb@ss knocks her over
  • Elke goes out, her back tightens up
  • Liane goes out and comes back
  • I decide to sleep for awhile because it just looks like the 2 of us
  • I go out about 7 and take the nice sunrise lap, a bit longer than the first lap (2:10)
  • DONE! Celebratory beer
  • Wait for Elke and Liane to finish and we all celebrate surviving our first 24 hr race together.
  • Perhaps next year???

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