CCCX DH #1: Scott Seery

Such great weather this weekend! I'm still sunburned from 2 days of bright, sunny skies.

Just a quick recap of the first DH of the 2007 season.

Arrived Friday afternoon and met up with a few others who had also taken Friday off to check out the course. I brought both a full DH bike (Yeti DH-9) and my new favorite, a Yeti 575 with Fox 36 Talus and DHX 5.0 Air, and DT Swiss DH wheelset. I brought them both, as one never really knows what to expect of a course, and the description on the website convinced me that it may be DH-bike worthy race.

The course essentially ran in a reverse direction on the trails used to get to the start of the race I ran in October '06. It began with a super fast rolling fireroad with two blind ski-jump style steep sections littered with moonscapes of erosion ruts and the like in the down slope transition. You'd approach each with enough speed (40+ mph) to unweight coming over the lip. The road then narrowed as it dumped into a series of tight 'n' twisty single track sections, some small ledges, some small rocky jumps, etc. Finally, the course popped out onto a paved section for ~100 yards, and then back onto single track, including a high speed, cobbly dry-creek crossing just before the final sprint to the finish. Although there were portions where a big bike would have reduced the speed pucker factor, I ended up racing the 575, a good choice overall.

I managed 2 practice runs before the park closed at 5 pm on Friday. The 2nd run I managed to snap a chain at the bottom as I sprinted the final couple hundred yards of gentle rollers on single track before the finish line. In 21 years of mountain biking, that is the first chain I've ever broken, a Shimano item with maybe 10 hours on it. Fortunately I scrounged a SRAM master link from someone at the venue and patched it up before I got kicked out of the park.

Race day came, and somehow I forgot to stop for breakfast before I got to Toro park. Darn it. So I drank tea and ate a few Balance bars and an apple. I saw Kathleen and her son just as I was headed up for my sole practice run, which I did late in the session. I had an early start time (13th racer down) and wanted to see the course in a condition that would be similar to what I would encounter in my race run. I donned most of my RockGardn gear (sans leggings) and full-face Azonic helmet to gain enough confidence for a practice run at race speed. It was no surprise that the tight, technical sections changed substantially from the day before, and so, too, did my tactics. Once seeing these changes in course condition/lines, I decided to race at a pace just fast enough to (hopefully) beat the competition that was there, and no more. I've learned the painful way that you only need to go fast enough to beat the 2nd place guy.

Once back to the bottom, I had just 20 minutes to rehydrate, eat a bit, and start the 30 minute, full-sun, push back to the start. I was already pretty fatigued and it took about 35 minutes for me to get the the top this time. I was drenched in sweat. Drenched. Someone managed to find and drink the water I had stashed at the top for my race run. Great. No shade and no water, and I had just 5 minutes to control the flood of sweat down my face before donning helmet and gloves. Before I knew it (and was ready), I was next to go. Dang.

Well, I overcooked the first loose turn off the high speed fireroad and got caught a moment in the branches of a scrubby bush, needing to downshift twice to get back up to speed. Not a bad mishap, really, but I lost a a good deal of speed. I was cautious through the new lines in the technical sections, but pedaled like a banshee where ever I could, sprinting all the way through the finish line. Soon I was looking for a good place to launch the contents of my empty stomach. My time was good (3:21.86), good enough to beat the guy I knew to be my main competition. I was 6 seconds ahead of him, and was certain I would be the winner, as the others in the class (45+ Expert) were 8 or 10 or more seconds behind as each came in one after another.

And then, I learned that some other guy - Brian Hughes, a Trailhead sponsored rider - had bested me by 2 seconds. None of us old guys knew of him before that day - Dang! Turns out he just moved up from the Expert 35-44 class, his 2007 racing age now 45. Darn upstart, gol' dang whipper-snapper! Although he had been in the top 5 in the 2006 Central Coast DH series, I had actually beaten his time at the October race, so I know I can beat him again. He's my new mark, although I still don't know who he is - he didn't show at the awards!

One down and 4 to go.

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CCCX DH #1: Kathleen Meyer

Our only experience (Patrick and mine) would have to be the GGG in years gone by and watching some of the Sea Otter. Not really sure what to expect...Patrick was excited to go. The only disappointment was not having a couple of his friends to join him. We were hoping to pack the car and get some of these kids out to check into something new. We haven't given up and will continue working on it for next time!

As we were told, there were a lot of juniors there. No shuttle so we started riding to the top in the mist of many people pushing their 40 to 50 pound rigs. The hills in Toro Park, while only a short distance from those at Fort Ord, have climbs reminiscent of Henry Coe State Park...steep! Even Patrick felt the need to walk but he still managed to catch up to me.

Folks were really cool, especially helpful as neither one of us knew what to expect. We met Brett at the top of one practice run. He lives at the VA hospital in Palo Alto. On paper he is just a number among the casualties from Iraq in August 2005. He took up biking as part of his recovery and now is an active on the downhill circuit. Later we happened across the "Brett Miller support team", friends from the VA, they were there to cheer him on.

While watching we witnessed one guy who didn't quite make the last left/right zig past a tree and its' roots. The guy slammed his front wheel into the base of the tree. Physics took over as his body followed and didn't stop until it folded over the front of his bike. It looked painful but the crowd started shouting for him to go on. With that kind of pressure (or support?) he didn't look back as he straightened out the bike and took off for the finish with the cheers pushing him on!

The Miller support team was happy to report it wasn't Brett!

Patrick managed to get in two practice runs before we ran into Scott Seery going up for his. By the time Patrick started up for his race run, the sun was hot just past noon. Patrick didn't have a good run, his time 5 minutes compared to the 4 or less of the others in his group. He was disappointed to have chain suck but as Seery noted, his brakes were rubbing. Still, Patrick had a blast. Enjoyed working on his bike for 6 hours this past week to get it ready and of course there weren't many there racing on a Bontrager Racelite (hardtail). For next time, we will get the Sugar repaired (I finally figured out when to replace the rear shock - when the kids crashes on the bike and it breaks!) and set it up for him.

...having the kid look at over at you on the drive home and say "thanks alot for taking me to the race today"...... priceless.
:)

Special thanks to the guy from TWW who delivered $25 to my door to help me take Patrick's friends to the race. I will be returning the money (and still trying to get the kids out there) but the gesture is a true measure of the kind of guys you are. It's a pleasure to be associated with people that care about kids like that.

Ride on...Kat

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CCCX XC #2: Matt Leonard

Alright, first race of the year! I showed up at around 9:15 and ran in to Rich. We got our stuff together and went out for a warm up lap. Unfortunately, Thursday night I found out that my middle chainring was worn. During our warm up, every time I even tried to use my middle ring, it just slipped like crazy. But the course seemed flat enough that I could just use my big ring the entire race. We goofed around for a little and then I went to the S/F line about 10 minutes before race time.

I lined up with the other 13 people in my category and we took off. I guess I got used to cross where everyone takes off at the fastest speed possible. When we hit the dirt I was in 2nd behind one of the high school kids sporting his norcal mtbing league jersey. He held me up a little on the downhill, but it was early, no rush. Once we hit the first and only real climb in the first lap, a couple of people just went right by us. But I managed to keep up, maybe in 4th or something. Once we hit the road climb, 4 guys were in front, but I was in another group of about 4 or 5 and we caught right up. I entered the dirt in about 3rd and we just kept the paceline going. It kinda sucked, just a bunch of roadies doing their roady stuff. We kept it like that for most of the first lap.

Coming across the line, I was in 7th. As the second lap went on, I kept the front 4 or so within 25 ft or so. They would take off for awhile, but then I would catch up to them on some of the more flowy singletrack. I was sort of bouncing around between 5th to 7th place. But I started to blow up a little on lap 3. I've been working pretty hard on the week nights, but not for any significant length of time. I tried to keep it up, but was really struggling. The little climbs in my big ring were really taking their toll and my legs were starting to cramp up a little. I ended up having to shift down to my little ring for the climb on the last 2 laps.

On the last lap, I caught up to this guy from Columbia and we tried to work together to catch the lead group. We took turns taking pulls on the road, but by the top of the hill, I just couldn't keep up. The last half of the lap, there were a good amount of people passing me. But mostly leaders from different groups. It was much different than last year. With the 30 second start intervals, people were catching me on the first lap last year. Yesterday, I don't think people caught me until the 3rd or 4th lap.

I ended up losing one more spot with about a mile to go and came in at 8th of 14. I was really expecting to do better, but thats the breaks I guess. Allan didn't catch me, so thats good. I think he caught me at every CCCX race last year. I don't know, I felt a lot faster. My new Fox fork was amazing. It felt like I was just gliding over the rough stuff, a huge improvement over my old Duke Race. Looking at some of the results from last year, I was right in it with guys that were beating me by a considerable amount last year. Crap, just checked the results. I was over 5 minutes behind the leader. Well, I was right with them for most of the race, I really must have blown up that last lap. The Columbian dude put 2 minutes on me in a half of a lap. Next time I guess I'll remember my hammer gel and try to pace myself a little better.

Matt Leonard
Sport 19-34
8/14

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CCCX #1: Schlachter

The rain helped create pretty good traction on this nice day down at
the old Fort Ord property, but there were a few mud puddles to help
get the sandy mud all over bike+rider. Drive trains were making
loud, painful noises all over the place.

The good news was that the
sun came out for us, and the day ended up really nice down there.
The bad news for Rich Davis and I was that we both ended up with
HUGE slices of Humble Pie. So much for me being in about the best
XC shape of my life... 18th/25 in Mens Sport 35-44...

During my first lap, I was doing OK, probaby a little better than
mid-pack, when mid-course, 2 guys crashed into each other and went
down right in front me, HARD. I mostly avoided the crash, but did
get a little tangled in my bike as I ran over one of the guys feet.
The other guy hopped up and asked "are you allright?" to the other
guy. When he didn't answer, the guy got on his bike and road off.
Nice. I repeated the question. The guy still didn't answer (just
wincing in pain and staring off in the other direction). I asked
him two more times if he wanted me to get help. Meanwhile people
are flying by us. He finally said "yeah, I think so." I hopped on
my bike and went off. Luckily, we weren't too far from the finish
line, and I told them as I was riding by to send someone for a rider
down. Later I found that they did indeed find him, and he ended up
getting treated by the EMTs - never heard how he was, and I hope he
was OK.

Back in the race, my biggest problem was my back - it was screaming
for the first two laps, and finally near the beginning of the third
lap, when I was contemplating pulling out of the whole damn race, I
finally pulled off and stretched for a few minutes, while what
seemed like loads of racers flew by. After that I was good to go
though - which was nice. I actually got a second wind in the 4th
lap, and passed a few folks that had passed me earlier.

My only hope is that only the hard-core hammerheads come out for
these early races...

-Schlachter
PS - Charles Price was there, and walked away with a 4th place
medal. Thank you to Allan for the cheers, and a few other folks
that cheered the TWW jersey...

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