Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Rattling Creek 50 Recap

Well after a hectic weekend, nothing I had in my mind to setup for the RC 50 went the way I planned. I wanted a nice warmup on Saturday followed by the drive out to camp for an early bedtime. Then the next morning I'd wake up late after a good night's sleep and put on the number, warmup and roll. Yea.....not exactly.

Life got in the way Saturday and I rolled home Saturday night with a lack of hydration/regular nutrition/and the worst part was I was still at home... So with life true as it is I got to sleep at about 11 pm and I had to be up at 5 am for the drive the next morning. So with packing and breakfast I rolled out with my lady Ant and my buddy Lucky to head out to hit up the 50. The last thing I really wanted to do was drive 3 hours the morning of a race and I had to so too bad. Then the worst part is somehow I underestimated how long it would take so at some point I figured we might reach registration too late as it closes at 9am. Yikes...pedal down.

So we rolled into the registration area with a few extra minutes and got ready. The warmup seemed ok but I was nervous as to how my body would respond. I just got back the Wednesday before from Colorado and the previous week I rode for over 17 hours and waaaaaay too many feet of vert. I was cooked when I left. I was hoping I had some in the tank for RC. As it turns out there wasn't many matches left in the matchbook for this one. Into the first climb I felt ok and was doing well trying to moderate my effort and it went by fairly quickly. As I got into the singletrack I wanted to accelerate hard as I was feeling pretty good. That seemed to work as I was keeping up with the guys in front of me and I was in the top ten or fifteen at this point. I figured I'd just chill there and set a good pace and see if I could pick of the guys that cracked later on in the race. Well I was one of those guys to crack early.

After 10 miles or so I felt kinda crappy and knew the wheels were starting to fall off. I was trying to ignore the signs but there were too many to avoid. Here's the thoughts that were going through my head:

This place is too hot and humid...
I didn't hydrate enough the week or so prior...
My front tire hasn't come off yet...
My front tire has too much pressure...
I can't believe my rear tire hasn't flatted yet...
These trails are nicely techy but annoying to try and race on...
I haven't drank enough...
I haven't eaten enough...
When is this going to end...

In other words - don't mess with tubeless tires the few days before a race and really focus on race prep. It didn't work so well for me this time.

So needless to say I wasn't on my game for this race. I passed the first aid station. Hit the 2nd not really aid station. Then the next one. Skipped the following and then begged for water when I hit the last aid that was the not quite an aid station. The first 20 miles I was really struggling with trying to keep my pace going and then after that I had an epiphany. Just because there is a race number on the bike doesn't mean you HAVE to race. I just rode. Then I tried to kick it up again and my body said no. So I just tried to put down a consistent pace. My best thought was that I may finish by 5 hours and beat the thunderstorms. So I kept on and just dreamed of the finish line. The last aid station that I begged for water told me it was 2 miles to the finish just over the top of the crest of the fire road ahead of me. Thanks goodness! Unfortunately I saw someone sneaking up on me so I had to go now...

I locked out my fork and put everything I had left in the tank into the pedals to get over that hill and get to the finish. I raced down the final hill and crossed the line in 4:41 for 14th place overall of 43 finishers and probably 50+ starters. I was actually pretty happy with how I did for how bad I felt. Still a great training day on the bike and some fun trails to ride - if yer not racin! I'd love to go back and ride some of those in a more chill fashion.

So one I was done I got back to the car to see how Antonella was doing and she warned me that some storms were coming and boy was she right. We wandered over to get some recovery food at the tent and it opened up! It came down in sheets and the lightning was close! Too close! So we got the car and stayed nice and dry as we watched racers finish one by one. Lucky wasn't so lucky as he finished a bit later after an hour or so in the hellish storm that engulfed the entire area. He was a bit battered and bruised but was happy to have been there and finished. Another one in the books...

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