I Love Solitude

You can't win on the first pavement climb, but you sure enough can lose. Close to 1000 feet of climbing in 2.5 miles with steep grade, at elevation, with the false comfort of pavement making you want to burn it up, which of course for most people would entail burning all their matches way too early in the race. I have done it before.

This year I led to the gate, then BK, Tim and Chris came around me, I just settled in after that and tried to keep my brain focussed. I got around Tim right at the end of the steep dirt road climb and BK soon there after on the barely ridable rock crossing at the top of the big lap. Side note, riding that section gained at least 10 seconds, per lap. end side note.

I then kept Chris in sight for the rest of lap 1 and lap 2, even though we were both motoring through the 19-29 and 30-39 fields. I fed well and took care not to go into the red too often, but Chris was on fire and put 2 minutes on me by the end of the race. I used the 3rd place 30-39 finisher as bait on the last small lap to keep me motivated, got caught behind lappers a few times, but so did everyone else.

2nd again, not so bad, I even passed Paz, who was my major nemesis last year and he started 2 minutes ahead of me. My time was my best ever at Solitude, not that the conditions were the same, but it feels good to go faster. I'm glad the initial results had Daren's time wrong.

Lyna raced smart and came in second 44 seconds off the win.

BK looked and sounded like he was ready to throw his bike over a cliff, that is not a rigid bike course.

Tim was a DNF, hope he is ok. Caveman was playing with flowers on the side of the trail, rock induced concussion, then his wife, coming to his rescue, got a doggy in watershed ticket, what a bad day for the Wildes.

I loved how Art put the fear of god into the group when they found out he was racing with us. There was nervous laughter abounding at the staging area.

No pictures. Boo.