race report: 12 hours of Gears

(photo: Mike)
ok, so our 4-lady team was just 2, and we decided to start the series anyway and just have a good time. Amanda crashed at our place the night before, and we got up at 4am to roll to the great woody north. Ben even came along to be our driver and Molly-entertainer.

breakfast from McD made us all sick. before the race started i probably lost half my bodyweight in the damn pit toilet, and no thanks to bibs (who gets bibs for women? seriously?) got to the start line late. began in the back of the pack, and pretty much stayed there. i think 3-4 people finished the lap behind me.

the loop was fast. sweeping downhills on open fireroad, a great pump section toward the end. a few log jumps but nothing i couldn't handle. and some twisty turny bumpy new trail with no flow through pines.

my goal for the day was, with every lap, to do one thing better than the last. i would take on climbs i had walked the lap before. it sort of worked but didn't change my lap times. in the end, the only thing i didn't ride but wish i had was a log pile just after a 90 degree turn into singletrack at the bottom of a rocky downhill. yeah, just couldn't get the speed and approach angle combo right. meh. the turny section in the pines may as well had a sign that said "this section punishes short people with toe overlap and people who don't know their bikes well." yup. i crept through that every time. i honestly think the Spot does NOT have toverlap issues, but every bike I have does, and it's a mental thing. something i've trained myself to correct for.

i did one thing far better though: after getting to know the course, i stopped covering the brake levers on the downhills. let go, grabbed the bars, and just let the bike roll. my mantra: trust the bike. it worked.

on my second lap i caught myself watching a butterfly and paid for it, riding out of the deep trail rut and up the side. fell straight onto my left middle finger, which jammed badly, popping back into place when i tried to bend it. dislocated? i don't know. i'm still pondering a trip to urgent care, but i dread the thought. either way, it got puffier and hurtier with each lap, and by my 6th it wasn't interested in helping me brake anymore, so my race was done. luckily it made the ankle- which started wincing at lap 4 - hurt less. ugh, i'm a wreck.

this is one thing marathon training has done for me- i'm far better at ignoring pain and pressing on. with the finger getting worse and me seeing stars, i rode a second lap before handing the bike off to Amanda, and after she came back I rode my 4th and 5th laps as a double too. they were short- less than 5 mi- and I could have kept going. My 6th was a single, and with my ability to use my front brake going downhill fast it just wasn't a good idea to be out there anymore. and i further justified it with the thought that those 6 laps were 1/4 of the 12 hour- had the whole team been out, I would have done my part. it was beer time, and as always, the Half Acre was flowin'.

Amanda did awesome. Her first time on the Spot and she was lovin' it. It was so amazing to watch her lap times improve over the day. Even though she was getting tired, she was just more used to the bike, pushing it faster and havin' more fun.

so, we took 2nd of 2. the other team had 4 members, and while it looks like i was faster than 3 of their folks, we just didn't have it together. it's ok. it was sunny and nice and we got to hang out with our Bonebell friends, Cody, smell the bacon from the guys cooking breakfast burritos next door, and catch up with some friendly folks including Anne, Amy, Regina, et al.