The plan was for us (Wiley, Matty, Rich & me)to enter the 4 man expert category and for Heather to enter solo female, and for us to support Heather when we were not doing a lap. But there was no other females doing the solo thing so we switched to 5 person coed open. There was only 4 other teams in that category due to a small turnout.
Prerode the course Friday then did the Hotel thing Friday night. The course was short @ 4.5 miles but had 2 big climbs totaling 780 vertical feet. It was a mix of singletrack and ski slopes, with a couple tricky muddy spots and a bumpy pretty long singletrack fun dh section
We found a primo spot Sat. morning, 15 feet away from the course, about 1/5 mile before the start/finish.
Lap times were going to be fast, and we thought we would switch do doing doubles after we each did one. Wiley had a great 1st lap, he was the 1st rider in. Several of the racers were going off course, some ending up making their laps shorter. Our #2 man also got lost but he wasted 10 minutes and found his mistake to make sure he did the whole course. Officials were notified and course was fixed/marked better. I was in the # 3 spot, I had a good lap but it was so damn hot/humid - not as hot as Dalton but definitely more humid. I passed a few people and ended up with a 33 minute lap.
As the laps passed on we found ourselves in 2nd, maybe 20 minutes behind 1st. Matty (who is only 15) destroyed his derailleur 1/2 way thru one of his lap, he coasted down the fire road to camp, we fixed his bike and he then had a maybe 450 ft climb to get back to where he went off course. Then during one of my night laps, also about 1/2 way thru I found a racer stopped with both of his lights out, I slowed my pace and told him to follow me, he kept telling me to go, but I kept telling him hang on my wheel - it actually was nice to have someone to talk to, he was a roadie racing in the duo cat (they won it), and he was super appreciative of me helping him out. But both hurt our efforts to catch up to the team in the lead.
We kept churning away the laps, then the short rests & high humidity got to me, on my 6th lap I was cracked, total bonkage, ended up walking part of the big climb. After my lap was finally done, I felt really sick-but my teammates stepped up, one did a double to fill in for me and give me some more time to recoup.
We realized we couldn't catch 1st, and 3rd wasn't going to catch us...I finally felt good enough to go back out, and when I came past our camp site - the team told me to stop, I found some shade & cold water and tried to cool off, then went & took a shower and put my rm jersey on before I went out to finish my lap. Then Rich headed out for our last lap, and also ended up stopping before the finish, waited 30 mins or so until it was 12:00 and finished our 38th lap, which secured 2nd place.
They didn't officially announce it but from checking ourselves & word of mouth we had the fastest lap (Rich @ 27 min), fastest female lap (Heather @ 33 min) and fastest night lap (Wiley @ 28min), and youngest racer (Matty @ 15 years old). The best I could do was a 32 minute lap
Pats Peak is a real nice place, two clean & updated lodges, one w/ac that was was so nice to be in after my bonakge lap, 3 bike wash stations, showers w/hot water, and everyone that had a burger there agreed it was the best burger they every had - next year they plan to add a 8 hour cat, a DS race and more of a festival atmosphere. They asked for suggestions and mine will be a longer course.
oh, our team was: Team Scribble scribble scribble yada yada yada blah blah blah
Prerode the course Friday then did the Hotel thing Friday night. The course was short @ 4.5 miles but had 2 big climbs totaling 780 vertical feet. It was a mix of singletrack and ski slopes, with a couple tricky muddy spots and a bumpy pretty long singletrack fun dh section
We found a primo spot Sat. morning, 15 feet away from the course, about 1/5 mile before the start/finish.
Lap times were going to be fast, and we thought we would switch do doing doubles after we each did one. Wiley had a great 1st lap, he was the 1st rider in. Several of the racers were going off course, some ending up making their laps shorter. Our #2 man also got lost but he wasted 10 minutes and found his mistake to make sure he did the whole course. Officials were notified and course was fixed/marked better. I was in the # 3 spot, I had a good lap but it was so damn hot/humid - not as hot as Dalton but definitely more humid. I passed a few people and ended up with a 33 minute lap.
As the laps passed on we found ourselves in 2nd, maybe 20 minutes behind 1st. Matty (who is only 15) destroyed his derailleur 1/2 way thru one of his lap, he coasted down the fire road to camp, we fixed his bike and he then had a maybe 450 ft climb to get back to where he went off course. Then during one of my night laps, also about 1/2 way thru I found a racer stopped with both of his lights out, I slowed my pace and told him to follow me, he kept telling me to go, but I kept telling him hang on my wheel - it actually was nice to have someone to talk to, he was a roadie racing in the duo cat (they won it), and he was super appreciative of me helping him out. But both hurt our efforts to catch up to the team in the lead.
We kept churning away the laps, then the short rests & high humidity got to me, on my 6th lap I was cracked, total bonkage, ended up walking part of the big climb. After my lap was finally done, I felt really sick-but my teammates stepped up, one did a double to fill in for me and give me some more time to recoup.
We realized we couldn't catch 1st, and 3rd wasn't going to catch us...I finally felt good enough to go back out, and when I came past our camp site - the team told me to stop, I found some shade & cold water and tried to cool off, then went & took a shower and put my rm jersey on before I went out to finish my lap. Then Rich headed out for our last lap, and also ended up stopping before the finish, waited 30 mins or so until it was 12:00 and finished our 38th lap, which secured 2nd place.
They didn't officially announce it but from checking ourselves & word of mouth we had the fastest lap (Rich @ 27 min), fastest female lap (Heather @ 33 min) and fastest night lap (Wiley @ 28min), and youngest racer (Matty @ 15 years old). The best I could do was a 32 minute lap
Pats Peak is a real nice place, two clean & updated lodges, one w/ac that was was so nice to be in after my bonakge lap, 3 bike wash stations, showers w/hot water, and everyone that had a burger there agreed it was the best burger they every had - next year they plan to add a 8 hour cat, a DS race and more of a festival atmosphere. They asked for suggestions and mine will be a longer course.
oh, our team was: Team Scribble scribble scribble yada yada yada blah blah blah
So was the low turnout lower than Dalton?
