The weather was less than cooperative, and the minute we pulled up to the course there was a nice torrential downpour to keep things interesting. Ran into Ross during registration, nice to see him. So after getting my neat number plate I took a quick warm up spin down the street, and before you knew it was 1pm and I was at the line.
The sport class turn out was all right for the weather conditions. Starting off the first lap I was feeling really good, legs felt strong, stomach wasn't too tumultuous, and I was staying relatively dry.
All was going well and boom I'm staring at the first big climb of the day. Since I'm on the singlespeed I had pretty much no choice but to grin and bare it, so I started mashing up the hill. Once I got into the tree line, I got a bit balled up behind some other racers, so I had to start hiking up the trail. This would be a common theme throughout the race. After a brief hike, I was back on in the saddle and climbing away.
It was interesting trying to figure out my climbing technique today, as if I stood and got my weight too forward my back wheel would pretty much uselessly spin. So I had to stay seated most of the time and put the Jones Bars to good use. Sucked.
As I got to the top of the climb, I was out in the front with one other guy, Chris (I think that was his name) from Coshocton. Then the trouble started.
I'm a pretty big propoenet of wool, so I was wearing a Swobo wool jersey and an Endura wool longsleeve over that. Worked fine on the flats and downhills, but shit it was terrible on the climbs. I was seriously overheating in the mid-section, and it got to the point where I faced two options.
a) Keel over dead from some sort of heat-induced affliction
b) Stop and take off my longsleeve
No one likes to die, so longsleeve came off. That being said, I was pretty spent after these climbs, so it wasn't as graceful as one would think. I was a big panting, sweaty mess trying to paw at my longsleeve and take it off, searching for any bit of manual dexterity left in my body,
So wardrobe malfunction aside, this is where the ride report gets boring. Stopping to take my jersey off gave me a bit of a time hit, and the guy I was following was long gone. I figured if I could keep my pace somewhat stable, focusing on gaining time in the uphills while trying not to die on the downhills I'd be all right. Here is my trying to do that. Maybe not succeeding.
I was all by my lonesome until about mid-way through my second lap. And then like an oasis in the desert, I see other people. Sweet!
Met up with a nice Camba dude whose name escapes me, and it was good to have someone to talk to and to pace. After shooting the shit with him for a while I decided I had a race to win, so I picked up the pace a little and tried to catch up with Chris, who dropped me like an hour ago. I wasn't too optimistic about that.
After suffering for a bit, what do you, I see him up the hill! Right by the men and women's split in the course. It really gave me a boost to know that I could at least see the guy again. I keep the tempo steady to catch up without burning myself out. I finally caught up with him and we started hiking up hill. Not super glorious I know, but it was nearing the end of our second lap and the course was getting unridable in spots. So after hiking up this monster uphill, I held on and hoped that I could keep up with him in the downhill that followed. I kept on his tail up to the double track logging road, and I figured if there was a time to make a move this is it. So I mustered what strength I had left, passed him and really gave all I had left on the climb out of the logging road. It was history from there. Just finished up at a consistent pace and tried to not take myself out getting to the finish line, which was maybe a half mile away.
So I ended up in first place in the senior sport class. Must have been my lucky day or perhaps a broken clock is right twice a day, right?!
Here's the aftermath, ignore my goofy ass blink. Muddy.
It was a good day for Northeast Ohio too. Rudy and Julie Sroka finished first in their respective classes (vet and women's sport), my buddy Andrew Miller won senior novice, Steve Twinning got second in expert, Ross Clark got 5th. I think. Good job to all.
I have to give a big thanks to my mom, uncle, sister, and my friends for coming out to root me on. It made my day to hear them screaming for me when I was suffering. I gave them their money's worth when I slid out in a pretty dramatic fashion right in front of them.
But yeah, good day.
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