Channel 3 race is part of the http://root66raceseries.com/ and was a great course this season, just a bit of everything from flat and fast to tight and techy then short and steep climbs just in case you were getting bored. Never stopped pedaling for long on that one and if you did it was usually just to pick up the bike and run up/over something.
Temp was brutal, in the nineties when starting at 2pm so I wore the camelback and pre-hydrated much as possible night before/day of.
Great crew to race against, point leaders Thom Parsons and Aaron Oakes were there along with Mike Joos, Greg Carpenter, John Foley, Nathan, Matt....the list was fast!
Took off at the start and just worked on staying with the pack, even in the heat my old legs take a while to warm up. Thom, Greg and a few others already had a gap at the first big log hop/run over and from there I started to move by a rider or two also.
We hit the first open road section and a few more spots became available as I was warming up quicker than usual due to the temp. Knew Matt O'keefe was having some problems as I passed him on the second climb and as we hit the the top I got the the chills, started drinking my GU 2/0 like a fiend and they passed. Kept drinking steady the next four laps after that, and chills did not return.
Moved into third next lap behind Greg and John, Greg flatted soon after that, John and I rode by knowing he could catch up easily if the repair went well so we picked it up bit. Rode together for most of the lap until I got over the rock/log on the new tight climbing section by just brute force and using chainring for traction. Made a bit of a gap and figured I should attack in case the blow up of legs occur.
Just rode hard rest of race and felt very good as I crossed the line, have not won a pro race in a bit so that was cool.
Nathan Rinquist was second followed by John Foley, Mike Joos and Mike Bartlett. Both Aaron and Thom had bike problems and had to dnf. Got some great thunderstorms afterwards that cooled things off but ended podium photography, check out http://mikejoos.blogspot.com/ he has an interesting sketch on his page.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Channel 3 country camp Root 66 xc
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6 comments:
Awesome job during the race, that is a hard race to get a big gap and you got one. Oh and thanks for including me in your list of fast people.
Although it sucked watching the race unfold from the sidelines it was also pretty cool. When I saw you and John go by in the lead second lap I was stoked.
Seemed like you played it cool at the start, maybe doing a little Ali Rope-A-Dope so you could come back with the knockout in the end. Beautiful.
Thanks for the compliment guys,
I did not even know what to do in the lead so just kept going. One thing that did help was riding the rock/log in the new off camber, single track, uphill section, no dismount made me happy.
Think a bit of that win might even have been sh** a** luck. :)
But hey, i'll take it.
Nice win Mike. See you here in ME at Clifford Park Sunday? Just say "Look out below!" if you decide to jump over me again!
nice job mike! things are coming along for sure...
Never sure what the protocol is on answering questions posted as comments on the blog, so I'm going to go ahead and try to answer the question you posted on my blog on your blog...now I forget what the question was.
Oh ya, chain rings for 2 X 9. Seems funny to me that 29ers are specced with standard MTB triple chainrings when the larger wheel increases every gear by a significant amount. For example the single speeders "2 X 1" on a 26" is 32 X 16 while a 29er achieves the same gear in a 32 X 18 (roughly).
That's a big difference!
Jeremy Horgan Kobelski runs a 2 X 9 with a 39 big ring and a 29 small ring, seems to work alright for him. The ratio achieved in a 29 X 34 is much lower than what you get in a 32 X 34, you should be able to climb most anything with that combo. Of course I have never had the need to buy or order chainrings in those sizes, so I don't know who makes then or where to get them but I'll look into
and get back to you. Or maybe someone else out there in the Blawgosphere can help.
-t
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