Last week at the shop was insanely busy with getting people ready for MTB Nationals along with more than the usual number of repairs coming through. I love working on bikes all day, so it was pretty great. On Thursday, I squeezed in a quick ride at Golden Gate Canyon. It was my only ride between Monday and the race at Winter Park, so I wasn’t sure how my legs were going to feel.
Answer? Awesome. Seriously. It’s one of those rides where everything felt totally on point. I felt ready to smash the Winter Park XC race on Saturday.
Saturday rolled around, and once I was checked in, I found the start and rode the first mile or two. I’d forgotten my Garmin, so I’d be racing off of feel- not terrible, but not being able to go back and look at my effort… Sad day. From the start line to the beginning of the first singletrack climb was maybe an eighth of a mile of gravel doubletrack. On the singlespeed, start position was key to not getting stuck behind granny geared riders (Pro, Expert, and Singlespeed women started together). I decided it was worth burning a match to be the first singlespeed in to the singletrack. When everyone began gathering at the start, I inched my way up to the front row with the pro women. I’m relatively certain that the other 3 singlespeed women hadn’t adopted the same strategy as me.
When we started, I sprint-spun as fast as I could towards the trail. The pro women and a handful of expert women dashed in ahead of me, but I was successful in grabbing the singlespeed holeshot. From there, the hammer was down. I never saw any of my competitors, and I took to picking off as many of the other women as possible. The Rendevous Trail system was amazing, btw. Unlike the first race, the course was excellent for a singlespeed rider to be in the mix of geared riders. The backcountry trails were gorgeous and a fun mix of a few rocks, roots, and some flow. The last five miles were through a network of neighborhood trails and roads, and were about what you’d expect out of that sort of system. I didn’t know it at the time, but the lady I passed with just a couple of miles to go was the leader of the expert women. I ended up finishing a couple of minutes behind the four pros, a minute ahead of all the experts, and six minutes ahead of the next singlespeeder.
Even though the podiums were way more timely this week, 3rd place had already left.
I’m really stoked on how much my legs have come around since I moved out. The Memphis winter was hard, and with the combination of that and altitude, I was definitely a slug when I first got here. Hopefully I’ve got the right combination of base and intensity to make it through Breck epic with the same sort of success.
Bonus pics- Indy is taking well to life as a shop dog:
