WOW, Summer's over.

So, I check my blog to discover (what I already knew) that I hadn't posted in forever. So here is the skinny on my racing since the 24 Hours of Boyne. The nice thing about endurance racing is that you don't race very weekend. You get some time to do other stuff like go to friend's weddings, go to baseball games, ride motorcycles and mow the lawn. These things, while not as fun as racing, are a great way to relax mentally form the strains of multi-hour racing. I just added up my race time/miles and it comes in around 77 hours and 861 miles. That is a lot of time and focus.

Anyway, let's go back through the races since Boyne.

LUMBERJACK 100
I still don't seem to have a good hanlde on this race yet. The pacing seems to elude me. I did have a much better ride this year than my first attempt. I was riding comfortably on schedule until... my seatpost broke at the end of lap three. I rode lap four not being able to attack the downhills or put power down without rotating, so it slowed me down a bit. I still finished 12th overall.


12 Hours of Ithaca
This is always a hard race. The course is really fun, but short. You begin to get a bit of vertigo aftera while. The nature of the course (roots) also lends itself to some numb hands. My 2008 nemesis, James Gomez, pushed me hard until the end, but I stayed some 12 minutes ahead of him and got the win.

24 Hours of Nine Mile (National Championships)
I saved my worst performance of the year for the biggest race. The only thing I gained from this race was a lesson in how to let pressure get to you. I won't do that again.

12 Hours of Pando
My best physical performance of the year since Paris Ancaster. I rode with Dave Sweeney for the first four laps and never looked back. I put four laps into the entire solo field and was able to stop by 11:00.