Well the back was feeling a little better on Thursday morning, well it was feeling slightly better to the point that I could justify my $25 of jonesin for a cross race after having to skip a few due to pain. So anyhow yeah I plunked down for a bit of suffering at Mt. Trashmore and Monkey and I packed our bags and made an early departure for the beach.
Race morning the air was brisk and windy and we brought Mocha (our 3 year old brindle pit bull princess) along to chill out and cheer us on. Both of our categories had a pretty decent turn out for a VACX race. Neither Monkey nor I were feeling 100% but we rolled it with what we had anyway. This time I skipped the pain meds until after the race so that my heart rate wouldn’t blow up and kill me and we could avoid another Dardentown incident.
The race course was fun and even though Mt. Trashmore only has 60’ of elevation change the course designers made good use of what elevation they had. There were two barrier sections; one double set and one rail road tie that was hopable, a cool but tight circle of death aka cinnamon roll and then there was a nice run up that was definitely rideable if you had any kind of climbing legs. The rest of the course had some nice sprint sections and nice off camber turns with good rolling ups and downs. It funny the more I race cross the more I find out about different grasses and turf surfaces. This grass was kind of like mud in the sense that you had to really push your way through it’s Velcro like surface until some packed in lines were established but it had pretty good traction on the turns if you had any kind of side knobs on your tires.
Monkey wound up taking a solid 9th in her class and I pulled off a 16th place which means I finally broke the top 20. Not bad for either of us having a training regimen that includes not riding a bike or honestly doing anything that resembles exercise all week until race day. I mean it is the off season for us Mountain Bikers right? I have to wonder when I cat up (if I can) next year what would happen if I got back to riding regularly and maybe even training for cross races…..Could a top 10 finish be a consistent goal? Could a podium be a realistic dream or do I enjoy the Belgium sauce a little too much to take this seriously?
Who knows. I do know that our beach buddy Ray came through with a solid race as well and some sweet post race libations that included some Young’s Double Chocolate Stout and some Chocolate covered Bacon. Because what goes better with top 20 victory than beer and bacon!
Peace,
Metro
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