On the road and ready to write(a little)

Well the family and I are on the road again we decided to take it a little slower and skip the first race of the NUE and race in Prescott AZ at the Whiskey Off Road then take out time to get to Dirt Sweat and Gears for the third installment of greatness. 

After the Spa City Extreme it was back to training and time to do a few XC races to work on some speed. most of the XC races were disappointing after riding the great trails of the Mas O Menos and Spa City courses. The Kenda cup races were the least either mostly dirt/pavement road courses or they were so rutted out or full of braking bumps that though I was on the bike I really didn't want to be there. 

I had ridden in Prescott years ago, long before I was racing mountain bikes and really didn't do much of anything that I can remember, just some muddy single track. I was very excited to go back and explore more of the area and enjoy the trails. Including participating in an Epic Rides event, Thanks Todd!!!! 

Race day was cool in the morning and colder after the race was over. the whole time in between was super fun.  It was a great course for me, long climbs, flowing singletrack, some technical descending and more than 3 and a half hours(barely).

I sat back until the end of the first big climb to make a move for the lead in the SS field, and only had to fight with one other to get to the single track first with Dejay in third place a few seconds back.  I knew I had the endurance and that a 12 mile long climb to come so I really pushed the pace through the single track, By the first long descent I had a gap and quickly caught a group of four geared guys  that were somewhere around 4-8 place overall. once we hit the bottom, they were going slower than I wanted so I pulled them up the next 30 minute climb, and where they thanked me by dropping me on the next long fire road descent.

The bottom could either really motivate you or truly wreck you.  you hit the bottom of this 9 mile descent then had to turn around and go right back up and do three more miles past where you started coming down.  On my way back up, Still in the SS lead, I figured out that I had about a 2.5 minute lead over second(Mike H - SS winner the last 3 years)  three minutes wasn't much so I really went hard on the climb only slowing down for a minute when I could feel some cramps, but then it was back to racing.  I also had some good motivation that after the top of the climb it was mostly downhill(with a tail wind) to the finish.  The last three miles was littered with riders from the 25 mile race as well, so I had some carrots to motivate me as well. 

Here is a great little video from one of the 25 mile SS guys, I passed him right after the two courses came back together. 

Whiskey Offroad: Hurt from Mark Challoner on Vimeo.

Marks comments on his video: "This is just a small sample of the suffering that occurs on the big climb at the Whiskey Offroad mountain bike race put on by my boy Todd Sadow at epicrides.com. I was battling for third place in the 25 Proof, when my friend John "Fuzzy" Mylne came stomping by us! Fuzzy had started an hour earlier than us for the 50 Proof, and had already been climbing for 12 steep miles!"

Hopefully I will be saying this a lot this year... after the climb was over it was a sweet trail(s) back to town where I captured another SS win and another top 10 overall finish. 

Update: We are on the road in Little Rock, AR and almost to the Cotton Mill in TN. I'll post some pictures that I have from the travels across the road soon.