TWW Race Reports

Check out our antics at the races!!! Or if you're having trubble sleeping...

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Downieville Race Report by Matt Leonard


Having never been to Downieville, I did a lot of asking around and trying to find out what I was getting myself in to. All of the responses fell in to two categories 1) Dude, you are effed! That place is so hard, bring tons of water, plenty of spare tubes, endurolytes, etc., etc. 2) You'll do fine

You do the Wednesday skeggs rides with all those fast folks and you are plenty prepared. So, I decided to lean towards the side of caution and bring about 4 bottles worth of water, a couple CO2 cartridges, spare tube, hammer gel, pump, multitool, and probably a few other things. After getting everything in order, John Blackwell was heading down to get his bike weighed in for the all mountain category and I said I join him. About a mile down, we both realized we forgot to put sunscreen on. Oops, first mistake.

After dorking around with John and a hand full of Sheila Moon folks, we headed up to the start where I ran in to John Hillstrom and could see Dan back in the sea of sport folks. The pros/experts went off, and the eager sport racers swarmed to the start line and I was about mid pack when we started. No big deal, I've got an hour to get around people, right? Man, there were a lot of people on that hill. I tried to get around when I could, and made a lot of passes, but I could still see a string of people a mile long as the faster sport riders had caught the slower expert riders. So after an 1:10, I was greeted with an ice cold Budweiser, which I gladly accepted, than off in to the single track. A little bit of traffic, and some eager people behind me. But I knew I had an hour and a half of mystery ahead of me, and just sort of went along at about 80%, again, leaning on the side of caution rather than stupidity.

I started cramping I guess at the Pauly Creek crossing, but was able to fight it off for most of the day and it never was a problem. And by that time, I was in a groove and moving along pretty well. Lots of fun single track, not enough traffic to bother me, but enough to keep me busy. By about the 2:20 mark, I was pretty spent, and had to do that last climb. After passing a few people, I was on my own for the better part of the last 20 minutes. A few people ahead that I couldn't catch, and a few people a good distance behind me. Once we hit the pavement, I was sort of stunned. I guess people had scared me enough leading up to the race that I kinda of crossed the finish line wondering what people were talking about for the last two weeks. After talking to people at the finish line, they basically just said if you weren't scared or challenged, you just weren't going fast enough. And I agree, I think I went in to the day a little too apprehensive. Even though I was pretty tired after finishing, I know I could have done the climb a few minutes faster, and could have pushed it harder on the descents. We'll see, next year I'll race expert if life doesn't change too much and see how that goes.

Lessons learned:
Remember to put sunscreen on before the race. I didn't get burnt, but still should have had it on.
Remember chapstick.
Don't bring so much water, I probably had about 20 ounces left over after the race was done.
Always run tubeless, no flats, no hassles.
Bring money for post race festivities in Downieville.
So, a few notes about the weekend... Apparently the Mice crowd wasn't happy I was staying with them at the campsite post race, as Timmy punched me in the forehead at some point after several adult beverages and Kirt's dog Diego pissed on my camelback. Tim and I hugged it out though. I think his depth perception was a little off and apparently it was an accident, and I gave Diego a stern lecture on urinating on peoples stuff. Also, somehow John Hillstrom ended up squeezing in to my tent, the smallest in the campsite. I'm still not quite sure what to make of that whole situation.

Matt
12th of 50 or so 2:41

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