Today was my 3rd Mountain bike race of the NorCal High School Series. After my tough outing at the previous race I had dropped to 9th Overall and felt ready to prove that I belonged up with the leaders. The course was about 5 miles with 1000 feet of climbing with each lap. My division was doing 4 laps so I felt that this was the race for me. The start was quick and we began the long climb, the ½ mile was on pavement and it was the steepest part of the climb. I was riding well with the front group almost to the top of the climb. Near the top the climb became very sandy and because I lost my balance in the sand and I had trouble getting started again. After this I was about 10 seconds back of the leaders and as I got to the downhill I wanted to drill it in order to catch back up. As I hit the first corner of the descent I hit a piece of loose dirt and was going to smash into a tree so I went down so that I just slid and hopped back up. The lead group now had a good 30 seconds on me and I was pissed to say the least. As we came through the finish area I was with one teammate and I started flying through the climbs and catching riders 1 by 1.
Through laps 3 and 4 Jonathan Mayfield and I rode together and were not able to bring back anyone but we could see some riders we were slowly bringing back. Near the end of the climb of the fourth and final lap we caught Stephen Wallace, a racer for the Redwood Team, and the three of us stayed together. On the downhill I started off behind both Jonathan and Stephen. I passed Stephen along some grass and then I was able to pass Jonathan. I stayed in front for a little before he passed me back, which was perfect because he led straight into the finishing stretch and with about 500 meters to go I took off and gave a great sprint to finish in 6th place. I was hoping to do better, but I was happy with my strong finish.
No comments:
Post a Comment