Entering Twisp: A Public Shower Community

Chris and I headed over the beautiful North Cascades Highway (Highway 20) on Friday June 24th to race the Indie Series 3rd race of the Mountain Bike Series over at the Loup Loup Ski Bowl.  The race was put on by Joe Brown of Methow Cycle and Sport (the local bike shop), and it was a fabulous race.  I might be 1 of 50 that say it was fun, but none the less I had a good time and was able to put some strategy into my racing. 



Lots of snow at the top of Washington Pass



As Chris and I drove through Winthrop and into Twisp I saw the sign that stated "Entering Twisp" below the sign there was another one that stated "A Public Shower Community".  I read these aloud in the car and Chris replied with "Wow that makes it sound like all the people shower together" I said "Huh, yeah it does, I hear they have great public coin-operated showers, I wonder where they are".  We continued on after a little laugh of the silly sign.



Staying warm and hiding from the misquitos



Once at the Loup Loup campground we quickly got dressed, dodging the millions of misquitos and went to pre-ride a small portion of the course.  The course is roughly 13 miles with about 2000ft elevation gain per lap.  We were not going to pre-ride the entire course, so we started up the climb and rode to the top of the fire road before the single track climbing began, then we turned around and bombed back to the campsite to dodge more misquitos and dress in warm clothes since it was cold (because we were on top of a mountain).  We met Kristen there too!

The next day was race day!  Wahoo!  A note about this course: last year I raced in the sport category and we only did 1 lap, and I was SOO thankful.  It took me approx. 1 hour and 27 minutes and it was the hardest mountain bike race I had done.  This year I raced in the open category and we were doing 2 laps.  At the start of the race there were 4 open women who lined up.  Once the "go" was said we took off and into the climb we went.  Now, as you know from my previous posts regarding cyclocross I do not start well.  So per usual I ended up 3rd person back, this was going to be a long race so I knew I needed to not go 105% at the gun.  For the first 3/4 of the climb up it was myself and a women from Zuster (?) Cycling, then she fell back a little, and it was just me climbing my way up the tight steep switch backs.  I was so proud of myself because this year I rode all of them, last year I could barely ride any part of that trail. 

Once on the decent I was having a blast, I could ride all the rocky sections I couldn't ride last year, and was just blowing by everything.  Then the first section of a long fire road came up and I decided to take it down a notch and not waste any energy (I did have a 2nd lap after all), that's when another women came up behind me and blew by me.  I thought to myself, well I can't let her go, so I picked it up a bit and stuck with her.  Once it started climbing again I was able to get by her and put some more time between her and myself.  The next decent on the fire road came and she BLEW by me again.  Going into the 2nd lap I was about 5 seconds back from her, but I wasn't really worried since I realized I could climb faster than she could.

I caught up to her and was able to pass her on the climb and knew that I needed to go just a tincy bit faster than her so I could put as much time between myself and her, and on the fire roads I needed to push myself so she wouldn't catch me.  I looked at the 2nd lap more as a cross race than a mountain bike race.  45 minutes of pure hard intensity to put as much time on her.  I crossed the finish line in first place with a time of 2 hours 37 minutes and 51 seconds which was about 3.5 minutes ahead of 2nd place.  I was pretty stoked to say the least.  I only came in 5 minutes behind Chris, who said he didn't have a very good race.  Poor Boyfriend.



The gang at the rewards



The tallest podium steps I have ever seen



 The following day Kristen, Whitney, Logan and I rode Buck Mountain.  One of my most favorite rides in the Methow.  It's about a 25 minute climb up a gravel road to the single track, and from there it's 1 hour plus a little of all swoopy downhill and uphill single track.  The funniest part about this trail is for a some time they allow free range cows in the area, so watch out for cow poop!

An awesome view to some of the downhill and lower buck trail



Logan and a cow ready to charge, protecting her babies, lucky for us once we got off our bikes they scurried away

 

Awesome views from Buck Mountain

And to put an end to my shower story.  Once Chris and I drove down Loup Loup Pass and back through Twisp I was looking forward to seeing the shower sign again, only to my amazement did I discover the sign actually said:

"Welcome to Twisp, a Public POWER Community"

I like my version better.