Jackson Zing

E-Pow picked me up Friday am and we headed out to Teton Village via Evanston-Cokesville-Afton etc... When we arrived, the condo was empty and the skies were opening up rain. I took a nap, it felt good, The rain let up and E-Pow went out for a pre-ride around 3:30, I waited for Ty and Ted and we went out around 4:30 or so, the course was not muddy, actually dusty for the most part, it seemed they had smothed out some of the tech sections while leaving others in place. Friday evening the gang was all there and we fed our faces and settled in for a restless night of sleep (except for Ron, Chad and the other Bobby who stumbled in around midnight or so).

This may very well be my favorite XC course

Woke up around 6:30, ate, embrocated (it was 55 degrees) and headed out to register. I then had 45 minutes to warm up, I did about 1/4 of a lap, came back to the feed zone, took off my jacket and arm warmers and then went and rode up this super steep-loose hill which put me on the final DH of the course, came down and we were staging-perfect. Ed held the start for 10 or so minutes as a pro had to cut the cable lock to get his bike off his rack, no one i know of complained about it.
We had over 10 at the start, including several locals. The start went off and I went to the front and hit the one track first, i then backed off a little, to not go to far into the red and just steadily moved forward. The good Dr. was in second at this point and I knew he could climb away from me, so on the short steep stuff in the first mile or so I put in hard bursts. Then when we broke out to the short Down on the double track to the short double track rise, I put in a hard effort and kept it steady in the first long single track, after that I just alternated between pushing hard and conserving, usually pushing hard on the flats and low grade rises and conserving on the steep stuff, including the dreaded steep service road of the devil. Starting the DH on lap one, I saw Tim heading off course down a service road, he yelled that his drive train was shot(later to be a twisted chain) a bit later I spied the single speeder in our cat about a minute or so behind, so I tured up the speed a slight bit more on the DH and out of the saddled the start finish climb, slowing to get my bottle from Kim Abbott(Thanks) and then proceeded to do it all over again.

I was worried about Arantix Doc surging so I kept pushing after anyone in front of me. a bit into lap 2 we started coming up on the 12 and unders, in the far north woods section I came up on one and warned 'rider' and she proceeded to fall over, I did a combo cross dismount, are you ok? and through the brush and back on the bike, the rest of the passes went well. Then on the steep climb of the devil my rear tire popped off a rock and felt flat all of a sudden, about 1/3 a way up the steep part, I jumped off, dumb, grabbed it, not flat, re-mounted and somehow kept going up the hill.

Lap 3 was uneventful, just kept pushing and trying to catch the guy with the most base miles of anyone I know, who started 2 minutes ahead. Didn't catch him though.

So in the end I came away with W #2 of 2009, about 4 minutes up on 2nd. I spoke of zing last year. Saturday at Teton Village, I had Zing. It was so diametrically apposed to my 2nd place at Solitude the week before, which was the furthest from Zing I have been ever.

Some race stats.
3rd best expert time
Passed all other experts but 1st 19-29 and 1st and 2nd 30-39
Lap 1 - 35:20
Lap 2 - 35:57
Lap 3 - 37:02

Sad part, got a 25 dollar gift cert to Fitzgeralds Bikes, which closed before we got there and was not open Sunday, sold it to the Other Bobby for 15 bucks.

Post race we took a tram ride to the top, hiked around, came back, went to mexican for Ty, went to mangy moose for a bit and crashed out.

Got up and headed home pretty early.

I guess the final race is NOT double points, which I did not know till Saturday, which means I sealed up the series with my win. E-Pow will be my stand in on the Podium next week, as I will be in Laramie racing the Enduro. Can't believe another Icup season is done.