After February's debacle, I thought the Snake Creek Gap had scarred me for life. The crappy conditions combined with me not being in the best shape to push a SS gear up all of those mountains put the hurt on me pretty badly.
Surprisingly, March's Snake Creek went nothing like that.
Camba race team member Rusty Brown and myself loaded up his jeep and left from Kent Thursday night. After motoring on down I-75 though the wee hours of the night, we arrived in Dalton, Georgia at about 9 am Friday morning. We passed out for a while in the hotel then woke up and took a little spin on the trails to loose up the road-weary legs, and to work as a bit of a shake down from my brand new bike.
Yes, folks, I wised up and got myself a new bike:
Yep it's got both gears (27 of em!) and a suspension fork. Thanks to
Bike Authority for getting me up and running.
So moving on to race morning. It was 40 degrees or so at the start, which felt positively balmy compared to Ohio, and off we went. I think a combination of the new bike, the great weather and the work I've been doing with
Sean had me feeling great.
I pretty much put the hammer down from the line, and tried to stay strong throughout the 34 mile race. This was ultimately a training race, so I tried to not go anaerobic too often, and for the most part, that worked out well.
This is me saying thanks to a little dude that was helping at a road crossing.
For once in my life, things went to plan. I was loving the ability to shift, and the fork helped avoid the dead arms that I experienced in February's race. I did fall into a giant pricker bush when hauling ass on a descent, hitting my pedal on a log, almost losing it, recovering, and then washing out on a log at low speed when I thought I saved it.
I was glad no one was around to see that as I tried to untangle myself from my bike and all the thorns that were ripping my legs up.
But back on the horse, all went well.
I rolled in with a time of 3 hours 23 minutes. Good for second place in the Men under 30 class.
This was only a 1 minute 50 seconds slower than the guy in first. I probably could have cut that time down by not stopping at the second aid station, as I was pretty okay on water and gel. Maybe I played it a little too safe, but hindsight is 20/20. I did get a pretty badass plaque for my toils:
Rusty battled through some mechanical problems, including a broken chain, and came in with a time of 4:09, good enough to put him within the top 15 in his class.
That being said, I'm super excited at how the race turned out. For riding nothing but base miles in the last few months, I'm glad to see the results in as race when I push it a little more. Hopefully this momentum will carry over to the start of the Knob series, OMBC and the Cohutta 100.
