Two Races in Four Days, What!?

Photo credit: Tyler Loewens

Racing twice inside the matter of a month is sometimes rare for me so getting to do two within a week is pretty sweet. And if you count Rafal's Good Life Gravel Grand Fondo (if there's a number pinned on your jersey or your bike, it's a race!) this coming Saturday as a race and it will be three races in eight days!

The Lewis & Clark Crusher was pretty great. It was super hot and I didn't make it on the podium yet again, but I was really happy with the way I raced it. Because of the heat, they wisely shortened the marathon race to three hours instead of the normal four. They also would not count any lap finished after three hours so, in reality, the race was even shorter than three hours. I finished five laps in just over 2 hours and 39 minutes.

I feel like I paced the marathon raced about perfectly for me this year. By my last lap, I was pretty much spent, but I still had enough energy to clear all the technical sections where last year I was having difficulty with that nearly right away.

Photo credit: Angelina Peace

I did manage to wreck in the first lap (I hope that's not becoming a pattern) at the end of the first descent. I was going a touch too fast for my bike on those conditions and I'm pretty sure I grabbed too much front brake and my front wheel washed out. Fortunately, this wreck had far fewer consequences than my wreck at Platte and it did not cause me any more pain during the rest of the race. While I was picking myself up, I was passed by four guys. I ended up catching at least two of them again by the end of the race and I'm fairly certain I would not have stayed in front of the other had I not crashed so it could have been worse for sure.

The next Psycowpath race isn't until August; the Tranquility Tire Tantrum, so we've got a bit of a break during July, though I am looking forward to that one as it's probably the trail where I am the least handicapped by my choice of bikes. Until then though, I've got Rafal's GLGF, Odin's Revenge, a family vacation to Santa Fe, NM where I'm planning to ride up an actual mountain climb (gasp!), and the Tuesday night training crit series. It's going to be a busy summer!

In addition to the race at Lewis & Clark, the first of the Tuesday Night Worlds, a brand new training crit series happened this week. Kudos to Jonathan Wait and Kent McNeil and all the others who are putting this series on. I think it's going to be fantastic! The course is a figure eight course in the parking lot at Papillion-LaVista South High School. There's not much elevation gain to be had at all so it's a fast power course.

A little raw video by Jonathan Wait from Tuesday night.

I made it all of 18 minutes into the race before getting popped and riding around by myself for the last half of the race. Looking back at the power data shows that I was in the red coming out of pretty much every corner. Some of that has to do with how crits work, but some of it also has to do with me needing to work on positioning myself better and maintaining momentum better as well. I'm sure racing at Lewis & Clark for a few hours 4 days prior didn't help either, though my legs felt fine going into the crit last night, so I don't know if that excuse really holds up. Regardless, it was good training and I felt like I was able to take away some more lessons on racing. I also rode there and back so I got in a solid 2 hours of endurance work as well.

I'm looking forward to racing as many of these training crits as I can and seeing how well I can improve each time. I think that I could easily be in the mix and animating the race by the end of August for sure.

Platte River Battle Royale

Don't ride muddy trails... unless you're racing and have the trail leader's approval! Photo credit: Angelina Peace

What an interesting race at Platte for me this year. I was more fit and handled my bike significantly better than last year, yet ended up with the same placing overall as last year (11th) and four spots lower in my age group than last year (8th). I think I can attribute my lack of improvement in placing almost entirely on the strength of the field. I believe the overall number marathon racers increased by nearly 50% and my age group more than doubled! Local pro, Brad Auen, toed the line in the under-40 age group, plus Brian Johnson who finished third in the marathon race at Swanson. There were a few other names I didn't recognize as well, but some were obviously fast considering their finishing times. Rafal Doloto, and my team mate, Jakob Wilson were racing as well. Both of them are faster than me on any given day.

So, I knew it was going to be very difficult to get on the podium like I did last year. I figured that it was still a possibility though, since anything can happen in a race. And, indeed, things happened that moved me up in the placings. It turned out that both Rafal and Jakob quit after four and five laps, respectively.

My nephew, Logan, and I made our own podiums! Photo credit: Rachel Loewens

Going into the race, I was confident that I should be able to do seven laps. I did seven laps last year, and I have better fitness and handling skills this year so I knew seven laps should be a benchmark for me even with a new section of the course that added a couple minutes to the lap times. I decided to make eight laps my stretch goal. If I could average under 34:15 lap times, I would, in theory, be able to get eight laps in.

The race got under way pretty well for me. I was able to get to my bike (it was, again, a Le Mans style start) and get to the first climb towards the front of the field. They included a section of single track on the climb this year, that created a bit of a bottle neck earlier on than usual, but I was able to get there without having to slow down too much. As we emptied back onto the double track climb, I was able to make up a few more places before hitting the main trail. I set into the singletrack feeling pretty good and I was moving very well for me. Things were gelling and I was flowing through the turns carrying good speed. I was happy with that and no one was catching me from behind yet. That's unsusual since I'm still racing my CX bike on these trails, so when things get turny and a bit rough, I'm usually at quite the disadvantage.

About maybe a third of the way into the first lap, on the kind of bermed S-curves just before the new section, my front wheel washed out and I hit the ground pretty hard, rolling on my right shoulder. That hurt! I got riding again right away (after gathering the food that had fallen out of my pocket, thanks Tyler!), and though my shoulder and side were a bit sore, it was nothing I couldn't handle. It took me a good lap or so to get my bike handling back under control, but eventually I was able to get past the mental block that can come with a crash and got to riding more smoothly again.

Getting back into the flow after crashing. Photo credit: Kyle Hansen

Then, in the third lap, I rode over a log crossing and on the backside of the log I must have hit it just right and I tweaked my earlier injury just right. Suddenly there was this sharp pain in the back of my ribs that just about took my breath away every time I went of a trail feature or stood to power up a short rise in the trail. It was painful enough that I wasn't sure I could continue. I figured that I would get myself back to the pits and make the decision to keep going or quit then.

By the time I made it back to the pits, the pain had subsided to more of an ache than a sharp pain so I decided to press on. At that pain level, I knew I could finish the race, but it was slowing me down. I was much more ginger over every trail feature and stayed seated on more climbs than normal. Going through the rock garden was the worst cause carrying my bike (no way in hell I'm riding those rocks on my CX bike!) really aggravated whatever it was that was tweaked in my back.

On my next time through the pits I told Cameron, who was pitting for me (and doing a killer job at it!) and my wife that I was going to need ibuprofen on the next lap. I was able to keep riding, but it was pretty awful. I hoped that the ibuprofen would take the edge off the pain enough to kinda enjoy the rest of the race. They got me the meds on the next lap heading into lap six and about two-thrids of the way through the lap I started feeling better and by the time I started my last lap (eight was definitely out of the question at that point) I was in really good spirits again. My last lap was my third fastest lap!

Cameron was on point in the pits for me. AND he finished third overall in the men's cat 3 race... He's 13 years old. Photo credit: Rachel Loewens

I finished seven laps in right around four hours and eleven minutes. Normally, I finish these marathons feeling pretty well spent, sometimes feeling awful, but this time I felt pretty good. Had been able to go for another lap, I would have. I think having that injury forced me to pace more conservatively than I normally would have. I also hydrated better than I historically have which helped a lot as well.

So, I didn't hit my goal of eight laps and I didn't end up on the podium. I honestly was bummed about not hitting the podium, but knowing how stiff the competition was and the fact that I was able to push through some real dark moments in the race means that I don't feel bad about my performance even if I was disappointed with the final result.

I learned, yet again (and more poignantly) that marathon MTB races always have difficult times in them that make you want to quit. But those feelings are generally only temporary. If you keep moving, you can usually get past them.

Now, I'd just like to get past the healing process of whatever I did to myself in that crash. It would be nice to be able to reach for something on the top shelf of a cabinet without grimacing! Ha!

Calvin Crest Crankfest

The final race of the 2015 Psycowpath series was this last Saturday at Calvin Crest. The trail out at Calvin Crest is one of the best in the area. With fast flowy downhill sections, a few short and steep climbs, and a couple longer (for Nebraska) more gradual climbs, the only thing the trail may be missing is some more technical sections that would challenge a rider's bike handling skills.

Coming into the race, I had already done the math and knew there was no way I'd be able to place in the top three for the overall point series. I think it was technically possible, but it would have meant me winning the race and guys like Rafal Doloto, Adam Stoll, Ryan Stengel, etc. not showing up at all or placing so poorly that they got minimal points. So, it was the definition of a long shot.

Coming off the Papillion and Bellevue crits a couple weeks prior, I knew I was on good form and racing a cross bike at Calvin Crest is much less of a disadvantage than at L&C so I had hopes of cracking the top three in my category for this race.

In the week before the race I was able to go ride the trail a couple times so could get re-familiarized with it and develop a plan for my race. One of these rides, I did with Tyler and a couple other Bike Way guys and saw just how much faster they were able to take the flowy single track than I was. Maybe I was wrong about the cross bike being less of a disadvantage. I decided after that ride that my best course of action would be to be a smooth as I could on the flowy stuff and then push the longer climbs pretty hard each lap. I knew this could be somewhat risky as I could end up blowing up, but I was depending on my current fitness level to support my plan.

I knew a big part of being successful with this kind of plan would be proper fueling. In my past marathon length races, I've felt my energy falling off a cliff by 3/4 of the of the way through the race. I'm pretty sure that was due to not eating enough earlier on. With lap time to be hovering close to 30 minutes per lap, I knew I needed to use the distance from the exit of the trail to the entry to eat around 100 or so calories each lap. I also knew I needed to drink an entire bottle of Skratch hydration for every two laps.

For food, I decided to make some sweet potato cakes from the Skratch Labs Feed Zone Portables Cookbook. Each little cake was supposed to be around 260 calories so I cut them all in half and wrapped them up, planning to eat one half each lap.

Remember above when I said I had hopes of cracking the top three places in my category? Well, as I lined up at the start, I looked over to my right and there's local MTB pro, Brad Auen next to me with a pink number plate indicating he was racing the marathon race instead of the cat 1 race like he normally does. Making third place was a big ask before, what with Jonathan Wait, Rafal, and Ryan Stengel there. But seeing Brad lined up pretty much guaranteed that top three would be a miraculous finish for me!

There had been over an inch of rainfall in Fremont two nights prior to the race, which made the trail a little slippery in spots for the first few laps. Roots would push your wheels sideways and you'd have to watch your front wheel around certain corners. I don't really do well in those kinds of conditions. I tend to ride overly cautious and because of that, the guys I wanted to try and stay with for a while got away pretty quickly.

I stuck behind a couple riders who I didn't recognize but were taking the corners at about my speed for the first section of the course. Once we hit the double track climb, I made my past one or two of them and led a few more around as well. I'm pretty sure the guys behind me ended up passing me at the two steep uphills towards the end of the lap since I didn't have the traction to make it up either during that lap.

I rode pretty much alone (though I think Tyler either caught up to me or was right behind me the entire way during that lap, the details are already fading for me) for the rest of that lap catching up to Adam Stoll at the top of the last climb. I stayed on Adam's wheel through the next lap watching him roll away from me when the trail pointed down and catching back up to him when the trail ascended again. I know for a fact, Tyler was behind us at this point, cause all three of us bobbled on the last steep pitch. I jogged my bike past Adam and jumped on to get riding a little bit faster before the final climb.

At this point, I was pretty much all alone fore the rest of the race. Every time I passed someone or got passed by someone, they were always racing different races than me. The only other marathoner I ran into was Emily Hoesly, but I didn't see her for too long since she, for some reason, decided to jump into the stream at the bottom of the course. I guess she was overheating or something.

I rode the rest of the race pretty strongly, I felt. I was sticking to my eating and drinking schedule strictly and it was working. I was able to power up the longer climbs each lap and stay pretty well focused during the flowy stuff. A couple of times I started to feel a bit tired, but it never lasted long. I just never fell off that energy cliff like I have in the past! Those sweet potato cakes really did the trick! They're not the easiest thing in the world to shovel into your mouth in the time it takes to get back to the start of the trail, but that was the only thing I didn't like about them. I was able to race the last lap like I was actually racing, rather than just surviving. That felt really good.

*nerd alert* Backing up my impressions of feeling strong throughout the whole race is the data. I'm a scientist. I prefer data over feelings if I can get it and as I look at my official lap times, I find that my fastest recorded lap time (the first lap wasn't recorded due to not going over the timing strip before entering the trail for the first time) was actually for my last lap. Bam! Also, my speed remained pretty consistent with the difference in time between my fastest lap (lap 8) and my slowest lap (lap 5) only being 1:19 or about 4%.

I ended up placing fifth and am totally happy with that considering the competition that was there. I was only 3 minutes behind Ryan Stengel in 4th place and a little over 9 minutes behind Rafal in 3rd place. Put me on a real mountain bike with, gasp, suspension and big tires and that gap will come down a lot, I think. Next year should be real fun!

Another fun thing about the day was that my wife and I were able to bring our daughter, Ainsley, with us for the race. She's old enough now that she can miss a nap and still function okay so we thought it would be a good time to bring her along. They have a great little playground at Calvin Crest and they opened up the pool too. It was a real treat to see her and Rachel cheering for me each lap and it even more fun to see Ainsley making all sorts of new friends with the other kids who were there. She had a blast!

Bike races will plum tucker you out!

In related news, the youth racing in Nebraska is getting really good. I think there were over 40 high school young men and women racing their first high school race of the season and some of them went ahead and raced again in the cat 3 race! Not to mention Abbey O'Brien winning the cat 2 women's race by over 21 minutes and Dillon McNeil winning the men's cat 2 race by almost a minutes and a half! These kids can't be any older than 15 maybe and they're putting the hurt on most adults. It's exciting watching their progression!

Next up is cross season! Our team, Omaha Velo, is throwing the first Omaha race of the season at Cunningham Lake on October 3rd and 4th. Finally, I get to use my bike for the real purpose for which it was designed again! lol

Lewis & Clark: Crusher of Souls

Apparently the others didn't get the "podium beer" memo!

Ugh, the race at Lewis and Clark kicked my ass last Saturday. Much like Tyler, this race was a much different beast than the race at Platte River State Park. However, unlike Tyler, my experience moved in the wrong direction.

L&C is filled with shorter steep, punchy climbs as well as lots of short, steep descents. I'm not very good at short punchy climbing, especially not repeated ones. Give me longer, more gradual climbs that I can find a rhythm on, and I do a lot better.

L&C also features a fun ripping descent at the start of the trail. It really is fun, but when you're on a 'cross bike like I am and you're racing people on mountain bikes, you're at quite the disadvantage. You just can't point a cross bike and let it go down the trail if you want to have any hope of maintaining control. And there's no easy one-fingered modulation of the brakes either. Like I wrote in my Platte race report, you have to simultaneously hold on to the hoods and modulate the brakes. Even though you're not pedaling, you're still expending energy as is proved by my sore triceps the next day!

My arms! My arms!

Needless to say, the nature of L&C doesn't really suit either my natural skill set nor my bike choice.

I started the race pretty well, if I do say so myself. I was lacking in motivation a bit, but my legs seemed to be going well. I may have overdone the starting climb on monument road a tad, but in the grand scheme of L&C, I think that was more a drop in the super-threshold bucket than an extra burnt match. I was some where in the top 5ish people heading into the trail, where my descending prowess immediately caused a nice line of mountain bikers to back up behind me. Had this not been a race, I would have felt bad for slowing them down. However, this WAS a race, so #sorrynotsorry.

You can probably guess how most of the rest of the race went after reading the preceding paragraphs. Tyler, who was a few riders behind me going into the trail, caught up to me within the first half of the first lap and we rode mostly together for the rest of that lap and the next. There was another rider who was with us for much of that time as well. I recognized him, but don't know his name. He was wearing a Midwest Cycling team kit and showed extreme patience with my sometimes less than graceful skills.

Every time the trail pointed up, I would start to edge away from these two and as soon as we headed downhill or something kind of techy got in the way, they'd be right back on my wheel. The course ends with some uphill switchbacks and "Neverest," a steep-as-hell seemingly never-ending climb back up to the L&C parking lot. I'm pretty sure I had a few seconds gap on Tyler when we hit the parking lot after our second lap. We both stopped for a second in the pits. He swapped bottles and I used the stopping point to eat part of a Clif Bar. By the time I got my bar back in my pocket, Tyler was already hopping the curb to head back down the trail. Aside from a few times where the trail curves back on itself, that would be the last time I saw Tyler until the finish line.

This was one of a few tree that had to be removed the week before the race.

I knew my only hope of pulling Tyler back would be if he totally imploded (does it make me a bad brother if I was kind of hoping he would bonk?). He seemed to be riding within himself though, so I knew that finding him crying in exhaustion at the bottom of a climb wasn't likely to happen. So, the rest of the race became a practice in character building. I worked on maintaining focus even though I was tired and keeping as steady a pace as I could.

I find that as I tire, I am less willing to put out the power necessary to clear certain features like roots and short steep hills. I have the power available, I just don't wanna do it. So, I end up either totally botching the obstacle or simply dismounting and walking it. This definitely makes me slower and is something I need to work on. HTFU!!!!

As I came through the pits for the last time, Emily Houtchens told me something to the effect of, "Your brother is only two minutes ahead of you!" To which I replied with a sort of "give me a break" summed up with a simple exasperated F-bomb, followed by informing her that Tyler would be beating me then.

Seriously though, the pit area mocking and cheering was a highlight of my race. It's kind of like cruising through I really short section of a 'cross race every lap. If only there had been beer or dollar bill hand-ups!

I ended up finishing 7th overall and 4th in the under-40 age group. I'll take it. After 4 laps in, I certainly did not expect to finish in the top 50% of the overall group. Plus, 4th in my age group meant I finished in the money. It's always nice to get back your entry fee.

So after two 4th place finishes in three available races (I didn't get to race Tranquility), I have a total of 32 points in the Psycowpath series standings which puts me in fourth place in my age group. Unfortunately, I don't see myself being able to move up in the points this season. I won't be able to race at Swanson which limits the number of points available to me now. It's all good though. I really don't mind. The races are good enough that I would race them even if I never had a chance at coming anywhere near placing.

Next race is Odin's Revenge on June 27th. I am really looking forward to that one. I had a hoot and a half out in Gothenburg last year and I don't anticipate it being any different this year. Plus, the beer Tyler and I brewed a few weeks ago has turned out quite nicely. I just kegged it two days ago and it's in the process of getting carbonated. The extra hops we added (plus the extra time we "totally intentionally" let them sit in the kettle after flame-out) added enough extra bitterness and flavor, that you could almost call this beer a sort of session wheat IPA, though it's missing the kind of hop aroma you would need to really try to classify it that way. In my opinion, it will be a very refreshing session beer, and I wouldn't be surprised if I come home with empty kegs. Though, Kinkaider Brewing
 will have beer there as well, so maybe I have a chance of keeping some of my beer to bring back home.

Are You Racing?

A 'cross bike in it's element. Photo credit: McColgan Photography.

Last Saturday was the Platte River Battle Royale, a mountain bike race taking place at Platte River State Park. The trails at Platte River State Park are among the most technical, interesting, and fun in the area and though I was very much looking forward to racing, I was a bit nervous as well.

I don't get out to Platte very often since it's about a 45 minute drive from home. Being married and a father of three kids who are four years old and under means the higher driving time to riding time ratio is unfavorable for getting laps out there with much frequency.

I tend to be a pretty conservative rider and have a hard time going fast on a trail I am unfamiliar with so I was very glad to have a chance to head out to the park the weekend prior to the race to get a few laps in and regain some familiarity with the course. My mom took our kids overnight (which she does nearly every Friday night cause she's Super-Grammy) and my wife and I drove down to the park together. Rachel did a little hiking and had some nostalgic fun with smashing coins on the railroad tracks while I played in the dirt.

Can't pass by a rails without trying to smash coins. #kidatheart

A photo posted by Rachel Loewens (@raeloewens) on May 1, 2015 at 5:29pm PDT

Another reason I wanted to be as familiar as I could with the trail was that I would be at a further disadvantage due to the fact that I would be racing my 'cross bike rather than a true mountain bike. While I technically do own a mountain bike, it's really better to race my 'cross bike. My mountain bike functions fine enough, but I've never really been able to get the fit down quite right and the previous owner of the bike, my brother, had swapped out the stock suspension fork (which apparently handled like a pogo stick) for a cheap Nashbar rigid fork with some unknown geometry. That, coupled with the lower-end mountain bike weight, means my 'cross bike ends up being the more comfortable and faster machine, even at trails like Platte River State Park.

Anyways, I was racing the four hour marathon race. You get four hours to complete as many laps as you can start within that time. The long and steady style of racing suits me better than the more all-out punchy style of the Cross Country races.

The race used a Le Mans style start, meaning our bikes were all laying on the ground in a designated area while we racers lined up about 50 meters away and had to run and grab our bikes when the whistle blew. I wasn't too worried about working too hard on the sprint for the holeshot. The trail at Platte starts with a 0.3 mile climb up some double track that averages around 8% but kicks up to around 20% a few times. I knew that first climb would probably line us out pretty well and allow me to slot in to a good position for me by the top. Plus, potentially being in front of people who would be pushing harder going downhill than I would be comfortable with was not what I wanted. I didn't want that pressure, as my handling skills are what I like to call "pretty good for a roadie."

Before the start of the race. I'm pretty sure I was asking Tyler if he thought I should drop the air pressure in my fork. Photo credit: Rachel Loewens

I think my starting strategy worked out pretty well. I might have been better off a little further forward, but by the time we hit the open section about 1.6 miles in, I had been dropped by the guys immediately in front of me who were taking the corners better than me and I had caught a decent sized group of guys who seemed to be starting to fade a bit after their initial effort. I don't think I ever saw most of that group again.

After catching and passing that group I attempted to set a good pace that I could hopefully maintain throughout the race. At some point a single speeder named Chris and I began to ride together. I can't recall now if I caught up with him or if he had caught up with me, but I know I was in front and was trying not to let the fact that I had someone following me cause me to ride too hard or to push myself too hard in the corners. I know I was holding him up when the trail pointed down but I would then get a bit of a gap when we climbed. We played a bit of tag for the rest of that first lap and all of the second as well. He was a good guy to ride with and never acted annoyed with my slower descending. He ended up stopping in the pits after the second lap while the fact that I was using a hydration pack meant I never needed to stop in the pits to swap bottles or grab food so I kept on trucking without him.

About halfway through the third lap my teammate Todd Ramsey caught up with me and we rode the rest of that lap together and began the fourth lap together as well. Todd was another good one to ride with. He is good at making conversation which always helps to pass the time. At some point I realized Todd was no longer right behind me. At this point we were about 2 hours in to the race and I realized that I hadn't been eating as much as I had planned. So, I pulled over and grabbed some more food. Todd popped up out of the woods a couple minutes later and was not feeling so hot. He said he thought he might puke and took a seat in the grass next to the trail to rest a bit. I did not envy him. We still had two hours to go and it sounded like he may have pushed a little too hard already. Later he would tell me that after eating something and getting some more fluid in him, he felt a lot better. I was glad to hear that. Not much is worse than feeling sick and trying to ride your bike.

Two hours after the marathon start was the cat 1 start so not too long into the third hour of my race, I started getting passed by the really fast guys and gals. It was also about this time that I started feeling the effort of the race in my legs, arms, and back, so pulling to the side of the trail to let the cat 1's pass me was not entirely unwelcome. I do my best to not impede the process of these guys since their race tends to be decided in much closer margins than mine, so I try to pull off the trail with plenty of time for them to get by without having to slow down. At one point on my second to last time up the first climb, I heard someone coming up behind me and, in my oxygen-depleted state, decided the best course of action as to pull to the side of the double track trail and put a foot down. I'm not sure why I did that since there's plenty of space to pass there. As the rider passed me he asked if I was racing. I thought that was an odd question. It didn't occur to me until a few seconds later that he probably only asked me since I was riding my 'cross bike. He probably thought I was just some dude out riding in the middle of a race. I had to chuckle to myself about that one.

The last few laps were a matter of just pushing on. The mental game really started for me there. My legs were getting tired, of course, but one of the big downsides to using a drop bar bike in a mountain bike race is that you have to combine your grip on the hoods with your braking power. Modulating the brakes while essentially pinching the hoods with my thumbs and palms put a lot of stress on my triceps. This isn't usually a big deal for shorter rides, but after a couple hours on a technical trail it really adds up. I concentrated a lot during the last few laps on relaxing my arms whenever I could. That really helped and I'll have to remember that for the next race.

I rolled through the line for the final time with a total of 7 laps in 4:02:39. That was good enough for 11th overall out of, I believe, 24 men racing marathon. Officially, I was given 5th place in the under 40 age group, though the guy they called up for 4th place was actually over 40 and they never adjusted it, so I'm calling it a 4th place finish.

Officially 5th place. Photo credit: Rachel Loewens

I was stoked with my result. I wasn't sure what to expect considering my bike and the course, so to finish in the money and to have my name called during the podium presentation was really cool. I was pretty happy with the way I rode as well. I kept the rubber side down the entire race and never made any huge mistakes. I stayed on top of my eating and drinking for the most part too, though I'll need to be a bit better about drinking more in the middle of the race so I'm not so thirsty towards the end.

Next race is at Lewis & Clark on June 13th and I'm looking forward to it!

I wonder how much faster I'd be on a real mountain bike...