pre-rides on friday were not out of the ordinary - scan for the best lines, check for trouble spots...
and ride with some local ohio riders - brett davis.
Start of race day was cool with temps in low 70’s, by mid-race, the temps would hit in the mid 80’s.
Trail conditions were excellent – the rain held off and what moisture was in the ground helped traction.
Start was hectic as usual, Nat got on his bike first, I was right behind him. Couldn’t have asked for a better start. Soon into the woods, things started filtering out pretty quickly. Roughly ½ way through the first lap, Tinker flats and Rob L comes to his rescue with a tube.
By the end of lap one, it was clear that the pace was pretty fast as I came through the pits – I could see Nat and Josh in front of me, but not a sole was behind.
This was to continue on for the next 5 or 6 laps until Tinker caught up to me.
I got a second wind when Tinker caught me, and we ended up riding about a lap and a quarter together. He stayed nice and smooth, really consistent pace the entire time. The entire time together, people kept cheering Tinker on.
I have raced Tinker plenty of times, this surreal time I was holding my own with a legend.
Rob L was 10 minutes ahead of me at one time, now it was down to 2 minutes. The heat and the Cohutta 100 were getting to me, my pace slowed and Tinker road away with the same consistent pace he was riding before. Rob’s time on me continued to grow again.
I continued on, staying with my standard nutritional game plan relying solely on Hammer Nutritional products and basically no stopping in the pits. I felt I was not riding that fast, and soon Sloane ended up catching me.
I pressed on, and when the heat went away, I felt better and my laps got faster once again. I held onto 6th, with Nat Ross flying and taking the win, Josh Tostado in 2nd, Tinker 3rd, Rob 4th, Sloane 5th and myself coming in for 6th.
Overall, the race venue was setup nicely and there were great prizes for everybody – cash all around (including single speeds!), prizes included 3 bikes and 4 frames and swag from princeton tec, tifosi and ergon. Great race that is definitely worth coming back to - you definetely missed a good race if you weren't here.
That’s it – gotta catch up on some much needed rest.
Sologoat out
3 comments:
Sologoat,
A big Thank You from the Team at Dirt, Sweat and Gears. Your attendance was huge for this event and we appreciate you coming down.
We are already working on next year and expect the second installment to be bigger and even better.
Thanks,
Grant
Good race, that was one stacked field.
grant - thanks for putting on such a quality firt time event. great overall layout of the course - it was nice to have some different feeding/pit options with how the course was laid out. really allowed the solo's to concentrate completely on the race.
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