This past weekend I was fortunate enough to get to go to an area known as Tsali. This spot is west of Asheville, NC in the great Smokey Mountains. Very scenic and unpopulated. You really feel out there. It's a great escape from Charlotte. Tsali gets it's name from an Indian tribe that occupied the area years ago. Luckily for us mountain bikers they maintain roughly 25 miles of some sweet singletrack trails that navigate their way thru the forest next to a huge lake.
Due to the location of Tsali, it obviously has a lot more climbing then I'm used to. I drove up the day before the race to get a chance to pre-ride the course and since my race started early in the morning it would be nice to be close to the race instead of driving out there at 4am. It's about 3.5 hours from Charlotte. I was anxiously checking the weather all week leading up to the race. There was a lot of rain and i figured it would be a sloppy mess of a race. While driving from Charlotte the wind was really blowing the car around and there were some big gusts once I got to Tsali. This is good news for helping mountain bike trails dry out!!
I went out for a pre-ride of the course as I haven't ridden tsali since 2005 when the future Mrs. Jonnynails and I were still dating. I remember Tsali being super smooth and flowy back then. Seems they have had a lot of erosion problems, because while the course was not technical it was really choppy and rough compared to what I was expecting. As soon as we hit the singletrack (I went to this race with my teamate) I was nicely surprised at how bone dry it was - good news!! The bad surprise is that there were 3 hill climbs on the race course that seemed to go on forever. these would be deal breakers for sure. I usually race pinned the entire race, meaning I redline my heart rate for the whole race with little to no recovery in the flat sections of the course. With these climbs i knew I was going to have to factor in some recovery sections so i could drill the climbs. The nice part of the climb is there were some longer decents where i could use some of my old downhill racing skills to make up a little time. The trail was running really fast. My computer had me at a 12 mph average and a top speed of 38 mph on the pre-ride!! I opted out of the pre-ride at the halfway point figuring that I did not want to wear myself out before tomorrow for the race. I thought that since i knew the race was 15 miles i could use my computer to let me know how many miles were left. This would prove to be a big mistake for the race.
Race day finally arrives. I get up at 6am as I have to get food in my belly and digested well before the 9:30am start. The nerves start kicking in. I head to the breakfast buffet for some blueberry muffins and a bagel. Check the weather - it's friggin 33 degrees!! Forecast is for a quick warm up to 70 though. Get over to the parking lot and start getting the bike ready. Computer battery on my bike is dead and I didn't bring any. Crap, no heart rate data and no mileage to know how far I have left - remember I didn't pre-ride the last half of the course! I figure after registration I'll ask around and buy a battery from someone. Get to registration and their is this huge line. After 20 minutes I finally get situated, but now there is no time to hunt for a battery as I have to do my warm up to prepare for the race. So after some needed pit stops thanks to nerves and some hill climbs i head over to the start line. While waiting for my group to be called I take out my gel flask and try to get some gel. Something is wrong and it will not come out. Great, now i'll have no gel for the race either. I rely on it for some energy before and during the race. The stars don't seem to be aligning for me today. I'm super jacked up now as i always am at race start time. Finally the gun goes off - idiot next to me leans right into me as the 4 guys next to him push him over. I get run into a bank 10 feet in front of the start line and boom 30 some guys go flying up the trail. I'm DFL (dead F'ing last). There is only 1/8 of a mile of fireroad before 15 miles of singletrack start where it will be very difficult to pass. I try to work my way up before the singletrack, but it's elbow to elbow and I only manage to get by one guy as we head into the singletrack. Now i'm pissed!!! There is a group of 5 guys in front of me and the pace is way to slow. One side of the trail is sloped straight down the mountain and the other side is straight up the hill. Nowhere to pass. I tell myself that your gonna have to be patient and pass where you can. I try to be nice about it and let people know "hey guys as soon as there is a spot I need to pass". At the first small hill I can see the lead group of maybe 8-10 guys on the ridge across from us and they are already a minute ahead. The next group is about the same size and maybe 30 seconds ahead. Patience over!! I decide I have to get to the second group at least by the first big hill climb. I start telling people "I'm passing, on your left now". There were some sketchy moments for me getting around folks, but I managed to get by those 5 guys by the start of the lung buster first climb. I could see some guys ahead of me about 5-10 seconds up the hill. I just put my head down and charged it. By the top of the climb I was in the conga line with another 3 guys. the guy in front of me was hurting i could tell (so was i - thought I was gonna pass out at one point) but I decided to strike while there was blood in the water and immediately shifted into the big ring and put the pedal down. Passed this dude in a corner - I went high up around him through the woods and it sounded like i surpried him as I thought i heard a little girl screaming. I rode the other 2 guys wheels for a short bit and again passed one of them in a corner - he went wide so it was easy, I just turned down inside him. Now a long rough descent had me all over the first guy in that original konga line. I kept trying to show him a wheel - an old motorcycle racing term to let someone know your there and put some pressure on them. Towards the bottom of the hill my tactics worked - he nearly stopped in a nice big corner and i used the hill as a berm and put another squid behind me. The course now is really pretty flat and flowy in this section. I kept it in the big chainring and hammered but let my heart rate recovery slightly (sure would be nice to have the heart rate monitor working now). I caught and passed a few more guys and then got a glimpse of that 2nd chase group i was after. We came to the "overlook climb" which was the 2nd big climb in the race that is named for the high vantage point and view of the lake at the top. I hammered it hard, determined to get to the that group of guys that I figured were in the top 10-20 guys or so. Halfway up the climb and some dude passes me. What the hell? He said "you've been killing it dude, i followed you through all those people". Apparently someone else was displaced at the back of the pack with me who didn't belong their either. My mind says, "bullsh!t your not getting away from me, but my head felt like it was going to explode so I let him go a little bit. Funny thing, at the top of the climb i slowed down to enjoy the overlook view for a second - kinda like my mind forgot i was in a race for a couple seconds. I had to slap myself and get moving again. Back into the big ring and time to hunt and chase down some leg shavers. Nice long descent with some tech corners that you don't want to miss or they might not find your body for a couple weeks. I'm back on the wheel of the guy that passed me now. I pass him when he misses a shift on a pedally section. I catch up to some traffic now and i can tell by the number on the back of their leg that they are not in my race class. takes a minute or so, but they let me by. Finally get to the last big climb and there is the group i'm chasing about 1/3 the way up. I give it everything I've got, but 2/3 the way up and it's so steep it is just draining the life out of me. Dude from behind me catches me again and at the top he starts going around. I keep hammering though knowing a long downhill has got to be next. he goes by and just as quick i shift into the big ring and stomp it. Right back by him I go. I finally shake this guy on the descent and set my sights on the group in front. It is now i realize that I should have pre-ridden this section. I didn't know how tight or open the blind corners were, didn't know what was coming up, and thanks to no working computer didn't know how far it was or if there was a significant hill climb coming. I was getting sloppy and it cost me a lot of energy as i was coming into corners to slow and having to accelerate hard out of them. Somehow i regained some focus and said "F it" I'm going to pin it the rest of the race - if i blow up and lose position who cares. I figured that I'm still so far back it doesn't matter. After some hamering for what seemed like forever, but was probably only 10 minutes I finally catch up to the group, but now I'm spent. I get around one of the guys thru a creek crossing and then another in the next creek crossing - damm roadies. LOL. I ride the wheel of some dude that has 6 or 7 guys in front of him now and the 2 guys i passed catch back up soon as I'm now at the mercy of the pace of all these guys in front of me. We come around the corner and dude in front misses the trail and starts going off the side. In what looked like a desperate attempt to save himself he throws himself smack down in front of me. instinct takes over and I veer straight into a rock. Both guys behind me go by. Crap. I try to chase them, but now they have gapped me by 10 seconds and I can't close. Remember the guy earlier in the race that passed me and I passed and dropped him on the downhill? Well he's on my wheel now along with the leg shaving crasher. I start seeing photographers so i figured the end of the race can't be far as they wouldn't hike that far into the trail to get shots. A minute later i hear people screaming. The end is close, but wait where did those voices come from? They sounded a lot higher up then where we were. Oh no, another hill. Not huge, but at the end of the race it's big enough. The crasher gets around the passer and now they have switched positions behind me. Figuring an attack is coming on the hill, i decide to slow down. I thought that there was no way I'm dropping them here so I better save some energy. Turns out the crasher had a ton of folks cheering him at the top end of that hill. He attacked in a steep section and I had no answer. The passer tried his luck, but i at least had an answer for him and shut the door. It was then a nice short descent to the finish line. I still don't know the exact number of guys in the class - it was in the 30's, but i ended up with 20th. Not great and not what I was hoping for, but it was fun and I had the mindset as this would be a training race going into it anyway. Seems I burned a lot of matches trying to play catch up and passing all those guys in the beginning. Lesson learned - next time if someone comes into me i'm taking everybody down. Next race for me is in 3 weeks at the first race of the Charlotte summer series which is a 16 race series at locations in and around greater Charlotte. Check it out here: http://www.charlottemtnbike.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment