On 26-27 March I raced the first Georgia state Championship series race of 2011 at Heritage Park, Farmington GA (20 min south of Athens). The big question on everybody's mind going into the weekend wasn't whether it would be a wet race--that was a given, but whether the trails would turn into complete muck. Saturday was a 4 mile time trial, and conditions were pretty good for the first 30 or so riders. Lucky for me the expert class went first, so I was in that first group. The rain started to come down just before I started, so the roots and turns were getting plenty slick. Not 5 minutes after I finished the heavens opened up, and the trail started to turn into a stream. If that wasn't enough "fun", a deafening thunderclap struck, taking out electrical power, accompanied by dime sized hail. The time trial was on hold, and then eventually stopped for good as the storm continued to rage. It was a fun warm up for the next day's race.
Thunderstorms raged throughout the night, and Sunday morning started with continued heavy downpour. I've never seen a mountain bike race cancelled for weather, but was thinking that this one might be. I got to the park a half hour before race start and found things in full swing--no cancel. I had a terrible time deciding whether to ride my old hardtail bike with a flimsy fork or my newer dual suspension bike that I'm tired of destroying in muddy races--and which had not much brake pad life left. I decided on the old bike--a decision I regretted in the first 5 minutes of the race. The race started with the usual full throttle blitz into the woods, with every inch of ground some degree of muddy slickness. I was just not mentally prepared to start so fast, and neither was my bike as my chain popped off twice in short order and control at high speed over slick roots was tenuous at best. I found myself near the back of the group and the leaders were quickly gone. I really felt like quitting right there, but I didn't. After a while my old racing nemesis/buddy, Joey Stanley rolled by (he started about 2 minutes back in the singlespeed class) and I stayed on his wheel. This gave my a little morale boost, and when we caught John Hoover, another perennial adversary that gave me another boost. I started to get into a groove and eventually dropped my two companions and actually started to pick off other riders. I finished going as hard as I could knowing I was getting faster each lap. I didn't really have any idea of my finish placing and was pretty surprised that I finished 5th. Not a podium finish, but better than a "Did Not Finish"!
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