Double Weekend Fun!!!

Saturday-West Va Road Race Series, Davis WV
Sunday-Massanutten XXC, VA

I don't do many road races, mostly just I don't like drop bars or riding close to people like these require or the thought of getting road rash or even worse!! But I need to pull a few double race weekends, and this is good op. So JP has a good knack to put together a 'road' bike out of what's laying around the basement and made a bike I used in the Dirty Dozen last year. It's a trek carbon 26 mtb frame, it will fit 700 rims and road tires, but has flat bars on. I ask the race director if gears or handlebars are in the rules, he says, NOPE, this is an 'anything goes' event. Super Duper! Off I go with high end disc brakes to a real roadie race, I think I will fit right in:-)

I chose to do THIS road race not only because of the laid back nature, but also I saw and heard the course was good and hilly in it's inagural year last year. I enter the open women fast group, there is a CAT 4, but whatev, I'd rather go for it. So off we go DOWN a somewhat gravely hill to get to the start......typical west virginia thing to do:-) We start in our groups, it was all I could do to stay on the back on the women group. I fell behind a few times, catch back up until we reach the first climb. Everyone just split up badly and from then until the last final long grunt climb, I was alone. That was ok with me! I ended up last of the fast group by 10ish minutes or so(?) but did beat a few of the cat 4 girls so being on a mtb & knowing I still had a hard race to do Sunday yet, I was ok with that.

Thanks WVMBA and wonderful town of DAVIS, WV for the always good time in your awesome backyard!!

Right after catching some sweet Hellbenders Burritos, we start the mountainous 4 vehicle caravan drive to Massanutten. We got a nice condo deal to squeeze 7 of us in for the night. In the past, I've only done the Mass XC, it's a USA Cycling so often crowded and with Pros. This year I wanted to do the XXC. I wanted the extra miles, and I incorrectly thought the fastest girls would be in the XC. Ooops. Just so happens this year the XXC got a little more attention and the women cat was loaded. Oh well, off we go anyway. Now I have ridden/hiked here a lot and I knew the trail was going to be god awful rocky and require some hike a biking but I REALLY underestimated this aspect!! After completing the backcountry out & back that was just gnarly and unrideable for quite long stretches, I finally reach the event area, I see JP and some guys standing there already changed. I am SO happy this is over! But I am very confused as the mileage my garmin is saying does not seem right. I yell to JP AM I DONE??? He yells back NO! go back UP the mountain again! I gasp!!! I am exhausted and beat, haven't seen another girl ALL day and really not wanting to slam over these rocky downhills for another hour, but up the mountainous switchbacks I go trying to be happy! Up and then this time straight down the DH course, but then some rocky singletrack seems to loop around FOREVER before FINALLY popping to the last DH and finish. Holy crap, that was long and rough. I was glad it had not been an all out pedal fest, the terrian here is adventurous to say the least and I am glad they put it in the course!

Thanks to MASS, WVMBA, etc for another cool event well worth the drive from Pgh!

WVMBA-Mountwood

Mountwood Park is an old fav. But also usually a muddy fav. I was not sure I was wanting to deal with Mountwood or any course in the spring mud again. After 4 years of racing with rim brakes, god knows how, but I am finally tired of it. I want to have brakes that work ALL the time!

Regardless I head down the night before, camp out at Mountwood with some WV peeps in the rain, do a short evening ride, and get up ready for a mudfest. It is just as suspected, a slippery mess. I hang in for awhile, back and forth with Mandi R. and Meredith while the faster chicks are already way ahead. Eventually I fall behind to the point that some sport men that usually don't pass me are passing me. That doesn't even get my butt moving, I know something isn't on, so I settle for just finishing for today and even that proved to be a struggle. Well, so far this year is not going too well! Can only get better:-)

Thanks to WVMBA for another good event, despite bad weather!

WVMBA-Big Bear

First race, used a demo Cannondale Scalpel.

The bike is nice, smoothest ride I ever had for rocky downhills, but being used to stiff ride I couldn't get the hang of climbing on this, and just myself did not have the patience to keep trying. Otherwise, a very nice 14" deal is sitting down at the shop:-)

Overall this race went crappy for me. I was not motivated from the get go, had some bad karma following me around, and the demo bike and me were not bonding. I knew this all from the start so just dealt with it in order to force myself to get an initial 'race' under my belt and hopefully jump start my motivation for the year a little by getting to see some race friends and chat for a bit.

Congrats to all the peeps who did well! This is a large turn out since close drive to the burg.
Thanks to Race Director Mark for the Big Bear trail system as always, and WVMBA.

WVMBA-Valley Falls

After hours of driving from Vermont, the nap at the truck stop and a hurried trip to a real bed, I was up early in MoTown and quickly found the Starbucks. What a good start to a day away from home:-)

The short drive to Valley Falls was nice, the park pretty quaint, hiding all the hills very well as we drove in. Rumor was this one had some climbing, so I wondered what to expect as Valley Falls hasn't been on WVMBA in the last few years.

We roll in and since this race isn't too far of a drive, we see a few more Pgh faces than usual. How nice! It's just Mandi and me for the women ex , Betsy (the usual winner) decided a recovery day was needed after she did really well in Vermont. I knew I was tired but thought this would be a good race for me with the climbing. I soon found out that was dead wrong. The start was a climb and I fell back faster than usual, even the sport pack caught me in what seemed like shorter time than usual. Bummer. This was going to be a long day!

2-1/2 laps later I was suffering to finish, but even that would give me a well needed 19 points for the series, so I rolled in 16 min behind Mandi, glad to be done!

This was a fun (and could have been fast) course, see the write up for more info and a bit of press DH riders got! http://iplayoutside.com/Events/2008/07/10567c.html

WVMBA-Blackwater

Blackwater Bikes is one of my favorite places to attend for racing, so I was headed to the wvmba series #8 race held by them this weekend, it's also the WV State championship race.

This year's course was all on the east side of Rt.32, the bog and moon rocks side. Cool. It was also the day after torrential downpour. Not so cool. Times were greatly extended due to conditions, but that didn't deter race director natzi Matt Marcus from demanding those claiming toughness to complete the intended mileage, pre-determined to be set a little longer than a typical series race.

DH was in full force, but so was Trek and all the WV trail experts.

The women field was big enough, I wasn't sure how I'd feel as lots of changes to bike recently and not too comfy yet. This proved to be an issue all day and sadly regretted it. Not knowing until the finish that several women had DNF, I rode it out finishing second to last of the finishers with Sue Haywood (trek) setting the front runners pace. At the finish (down the street from the event HQ), Justin waited with a big laugh at me for being a putz, while Gunnar, Betsy and Roger attempted to comfort me with some fake cheering. It worked a little :-)

DH Rob Spreng ran into bad luck only 1 mile in, ripping der off in a muddy bog (watch out, there are rocks in them thar bogs). Everyone else has a rough but very good finish for the day, considering the line up of pros present.

Too much mud to talk about, if your curious see the write up/photos/results at: http://www.iplayoutside.com/Events/?eid=2008/06/10565c.html