Progress and Relief

With the passing of this years Wilderness 101 I can officially say that my two premier events(Mohican 100 being the other) have passed and I am completely satisfied with my performance of each. They were completely different and both very satisfying. All of my work this season has paid off and it's been really nice to see the progress that I've been making.

So with that said I think it's time to enjoy the rest of my season and not worry too much about making certain time goals and riding myself into oblivion. Even as I type that though I know I'm still going to dig too deep and meet whatever new goals I make up in my head so take it with a grain of salt. Once this competitive vibe sets in is there really a way to decrease it? Doubtful...

For the remainder of my season it's 6 races. 2 hundies, 3 local H2H races, and a Halloween night TT. Next up is the Fools Gold 100 which will be a first for me as the humidity in mid August in Georgia has seemed overwhelming but I'm going to take a stab at it. It's two 50 mile laps and hopefully some really sweet singletrack. I know there's a ton of elevation involved which is fine as long as there's not 40 miles of super techy slow singletrack. That would make for a really long day. From what I've read and heard I shouldn't be disappointed. Looking forward to it in only 11 days. I'm not exactly sure how the recovery game will play out but hopefully I'll have some game on race day.

The next big race will be the Shenandoah 100. This is one beautiful area and an amazing course. I've been to this race last year and also prerode it before the race so it'll be my third time on the course. Of all the 100's I know this one the best. It'll be nice since it'll be towards the end of the season and with a decent race at the Fools Gold it should hold no bearing on my finish in the NUE series. Since I'll have the 4 finishes SM100 will be my fifth and unless I have a jet pack strapped to my bike I doubt that I'd come any where near my other finishes since the entire east coast seems to attend the Shenandoah race, and they are all faster than me.

The debate is already starting for Shenandoah though. Since it will be a race that personally will be more fun, do I try to enjoy besting my horrid time of 10:39 last year with the gears, or do I try and finish the race on my SS. The debate will linger on in my head any way. It may depend on how badly I want to treat my body or actually have some juice left to race the remainder of the H2H races.