A disappointing way to end a fantastic season

I hate the year of the La Nina, we can't even have a summer!!!

So I had to escape to Sun Valley, ID for some Mountain Bike Nationals and oh what fun did I have!  Sun Valley is not close.  Chris, Whitney, and I packed the car up on Tuesday morning and we headed to Sun Valley.  We didn't get in until 2:30am Wednesday morning, it was a long long long drive.  Thank goodness Idaho has a speed limit of 75mph.   I was able to get us some host housing from someone who used to work at the gym, it was so genorous of him (thanks Randy)!  He had the sweetest little dog named Kaiya, and I am not a dog person, but she was just so stinken' cute!  I should have taken a picture of her. 

If you have been following my blog you know that I have been racing in the Open women catgeory.  I originally wanted to race in this category for the challenge and the pay!  As it turned out, it is the category I should be racing in for our local races.  Which tells me that at a sanctioned race I should probably be a Cat 1 rider.  Unfortunately in WA we do not have sanctioned mountain bike races, with the exception of the 1 national qualifer race we had this year.  I raced in the Cat 2 race because that's my official category on my licence.  So at nationals I had to race in the Cat 2 race as well, which I wasn't too stoked about, but I did it so I could get my official Cat 1 upgrade.



Pros are awesome.  Georgia Gould hustling through the rock garden



Wednesday afternoon we pre-rode the amature race course, and it was SOOO hard!  The course was set up on Baldy Mountain (one of the ski mountains there) and we were around 6,000 ft elevation.  Our course started with 2 prologue loops which took about 5 minutes or less.  You started up a steep steep ski run and turned left into the start of a single track decent and down and over to the main staging area, over a fly over, and onto the rock garden and then back up the prologue or to the main large loop.  The main loop of the course took you through a steep single track climb with loose dirt, sand, and rocks.  Along the climb there were tough roots to get up and over at the top of the steep climbs, they were challenging!  I was breathing really hard, but I was enjoying the toughness of the course, it suited me well.  Once at the top of the single track there was a fire road climb, before decending down some fire road and onto the long single track decent.  The decent was entertaining, but the switchbacks where really loose!  The decent wasn't technical at all, just very very loose and marbly.  When we finished the loop, I thought to myself, this wont be too bad tomorrow, it might be a cluster ***k the first time through the prologue loops, but I think it will be okay. 

I was wrong.

Do you ever wake up and you just aren't ready to race?  Or your nerves are so twisted in knots that you can barely function?  I felt a lot of pressure that day.  Everyone I ran into kept saying to me "oh you're going to smash the field, and you're going to win, blah blah blah".  It made me really nervous, and when I look around at people all dressed up in their spandex, I get intimadated, everyone looks so freakin' fast.  When I got to the race I looked at the start list, and my jaw dropped.  They where starting each category 30 seconds apart, there where roughly 10 categories, with about 200 people total.  I got to go 2nd to last.  This wasn't good. 

Chris and I warmed up and went to staging.  My group slowly crawled forward as the other racers where starting, and then it was our turn, and I got the hole shot!  I was the first one up the hill, and I wasn't even working at full capacity, so I just told myseld, hold steady and you will win.  Then, I got to the first set of single track and I had to get off my bike and wait in line.  There was probably about 10 men in front of me waiting to enter the single track.  So all that work I put into climbing the hill, didn't get me any further away from the women in my field.  Once I hit the rock garden there where a couple of men in front of me but I was able to maneuver my way around them and get through it unscathed and on my bike.  2nd prologue lap up the hill and into the single track and the line to enter was even longer (how is that possible?).  So I got off my bike and I waited in line for the 2nd time in 10 or less minutes.  It was stupid.  I managed to pull away from the women on the decent and this time through the rock garden there where lots of men in my way who didn't know how to ride their bikes.  They got in my way and forced me to get off my bike and run with the damn thing (can you tell I'm getting fired up writing this?).  I thought to myself, this is not a cross race this bike is heavy, I don't like this.  I entered the single track as the first women, and I was feeling SO good!  Then about 3 minutes into the single track all of my hopes and dreams where crushed when I saw the line of 30 plus people WALKING their bikes up the trail.  My first thoughts where...okay this happens, it wont be long.  But then it really was a long time, people where seriously NOT riding anything, and most of the stuff was ridable.  I was so angry, but then I got even more angry when all of the sudden I heard female voices behind me.  Turns out they where pushing men out of the way to get further up the walking train.  That didn't make me happy, and nor did it make the man that was directly behind me happy.  THeir conversation went something like this:

Man: What are you doing?  I am not letting you by me

Females: We want to race with the women

Man: Uh the race leader is right in front of me, you ARE racing with the women.  She has been walking behind all these people too, wait your turn. 

Females: Let us by, you aren't even racing

Me (at this point I am incredibly angry): I have been patiently waiting behind all these people, if you really want first place THAT bad come up here and get it.

Females procede to push by the man, the man then pushes one of the females into the hill side and she falls down.  That makes me happy because she was having poor sportsmanship. 

75% up the hill and people finally start riding their bikes and I don't see the women again, because THEY CAN'T CLIMB!   I am pretty sure if people would have not been dumb and walked their bikes, or if they would have gotten out of my way I would have rocked that course.  But instead I had to push my bike up the fun stuff because too many people didn't know how to ride.  Once I was finally on my bike and pedaling I caught even more men, and they wouldn't let me by them.  I would ask and they would say no, it made me even more mad.  So I would ride next to them on the hill side to get by.  Then I hit the fire road climb and I was angry and not tired.  Then I hit the decent and was still angry and bitter.  I couldn't find an ounce of positive in me.  On the last switch back of the course I pulled over to let a man go that was behind me, and turns out a really fast women on the downhill whizzed on by as well.  OOPS.  I shouldn't have been so nice.  At that point though, I didn't even care.   When I finished I don't think I was even sweaty, I wasn't even tired.  I went on another ride and a run later that day. 

 I finished the race in 1 hour and 3 minutes and 59 seconds.  Their estimated time was 1 hour and 30-45 minutes.   I paid $63.50 to hike my bike up Baldy Mountain.  Dear USA Cycling, I WANT MY MONEY BACK!  That race was the most poorly planned out race I have ever participated in.  I am so dissapointed with the way the lower categories where treated.  I put in for my Category 1 upgrade today, so I should be able to race in the ACTUAL catgeory I belong in, that is if I decide to go back next year. 

Chris managed to pull off a first place finish in his race.  He was the first category to go off so he had a very different race experience than I did.  He didn't have to hike his bike up the mountain because there was no one in front of him, except for one rider!  I was jealous of him.  The climb would have been such a feat to do...if only I could have experienced it during the race. 



Chris on the podium



On a really positive note Sun Valley has awesome riding and weather.  The day after the race Chris, Whitney, and I rode around the outside perimeter of Baldy Mountain.  We went up Cold Springs and down Warm Springs, for about a 3 hour beautiful ride!  The decent down Warm Springs was incredible, you hardly had to use your brakes, the trail flowed so well.  Here are some pictures:



Us three at the intersection of Cold Springs and Warm Springs



Myself and the mountains of Sun Valley



 On Sunday Chris raced the Super D race.  This race is a cross country downhill event, with some hills interspersed to prevent people from racing on straight downhill bikes.  This particular course had the riders take the Gondola to the top of the mountain, immediatly start with an uphill half mile climb and then they hit the blazing fast sketchy marbly decent.  This picture is of Chris coming down the rock waterfall.  Of course, he didn't take the right line and almost crashed hard core, then he almost ran into course tape and spectators.  It gave the spectators something aww at. 

There you have it, our weekend of racing and riding packed into one long blog post.  On Thursday Chris and I head back over the mountains to Suncadia for the summer cyclocross race.  This should be a good race to see how much I need to train for the fall.  I am giving myself some high ambitions for this coming cross season so I can't wait to see what I need to work on.