So I mangaged to finsih a bike race... boring bike racing blogging.

I updated the sidebars and stuff on this blog. So now it is like a live RSS feed. I like that.

Thursday I rode mountain bikes with my brother. It was my first time in the woods in 6 months or so. I said "dude I considered doing a big mountain bike race this weekend, glad I am not going ... I would have gotten shredded."

Then it was announced that the local Mingo race was canceled.

So Mayhew and I drove down to the Greenbrier (said big mountain bike race) resort with Terry following us in his truck. Terry was driving past Pittsburgh and stopped, hoping to race Mingo with us. Instead he got to drive most of the way home to DC alongside us.

Basically, my goal was to finish the race in a not embarrassing time. To quote Marge Simpson "aim low so you can never be disappointed in yourself."

This was my first real "PRO" mountain bike race I guess. Weird. I lined up toward the back. I didnt complain when a few dudes pull the "John Minturn" and rode up from the front and turned their bikes around in order to be on the front row. I just sat there and peed myself a bit.

First lap dudes go really fast.Usual douchery occurs and guys are giving me elbows and crap. There was one dude in particular who really wanted around me. Maybe he didnt know who I was and didnt trust me in front of him? Maybe he DID know who I was and didnt trust me in front of him! Either way I could write a two page blog about the amount of energy this dude wasted trying to pass me and how I would take a ratchet pedal and close his line, or box him out. First lap, new goal: beat this dude.

I count the dudes in the lead group as they ride away, to see if I am still in the money. This is something I feel that I have gotten good at in my cycling days. I can count the dudes in a mountain or cross race to try and figure if I am still in the cash or the UCI points or whatever. It is a unique skill set. I swear to god that I counted 8 in front of me, putting me right in line to either get the last cash or not get paid. Awesome.

I got rid of Mr Elbows, and I caught a fast dude on a descent (wtf?) and rode with him for a half a lap. I have raced him before and feel that we should be friends. He is "vegan rob" and has straight edge tattoos. After a half of a lap I was basically like "dude lets not attack each other, lets keep our pace in check and just hold our position. He seemed down with that. We still had like 90 more minutes of racing to go.

Then people start telling us that we are in 4th and 5th place. How on earth that happened, I have no idea. We only passed one other pro (young joe dombrowski)... which meant either they were wrong or my initial count was wrong.

Bike racing bike racing, Rob rides away from me in some rocks.

I hold on for 5th. Sweet. First good ride of the year. Stoked.

REAL BIKE RACING:
http://www.youtube.com/user/worldcyclingchannel2: This youtube channel rules. They put up races like hours after they finish. Like every big race. The last 20k of Liege are up.