This one will be short, because my race was short.
To begin: I felt great. I adjusted my food intake before the race, and during preride I felt a little sick, but that went away at the start line (I might eat a little less next time). During preride I felt pretty good, and there was only one section I was not 100% confident in, and it wasn't even that bad.
I eat some homemade goo right before rolling to the start line, pumped for the first race of the season. It was about 90 degrees, so it was hot. But my legs were feeling great.
I slot in about halfway back, but then I get a great surprise- front row callup! The promoter called up a few people for a variety of reasons, mine being that both he and I grew up in Michigan. So then I was super stoked. The start was a sight downhill hardpack with a little loose gravel then a slight left on grass over a little bump then a tiny bit less slight right then a sharp 180 left hander, but it was all very wide and no danger of bottlenecking right at the gun. I believe there were 63 guys in our race. At the start I take off as hard as I can, and I am in first place. I then back off a little bit, because I don't feel near confident enough to be at the front of the race. The nerves would get to me and I would take a corner too hot and fall. I need a little more experience off-road. So I back off and a let a couple guys go around me, then I hit the gas again. Soon after the right hander, a UVA guy tries to come around my left side, and I'm not sure exactly what happened to him, but he went down pretty hard. I came inches from smashing into the back of his head, but I escaped around him and was in the clear. This left me sitting 7th with a nice gap between me and 8th, cause everyone else had to slow down quite a bit behind the UVA guy. At the barriers I pass one guy, just a little quicker on the dismount->run transition I was. I finally figured out how to remount without a stutter step, and I was excited to try it in a race. However, the ground after the barriers was very rooty and bumpy, and made it exceedingly difficult, but I jumped up really high and landed on my saddle nice and hard. It hurt a little, but I shook it off and kept going. So now I'm in 6th place, and I pass another guy soon after the barriers.
We get to a very tight 180 left hander on some sandy ground, and I was determined to pass the guy in front of me on the turn. In preride I was never able to swing my bike around all that fast, so I was quick racking my brain on what I could do, then it hit me. I stuck out my inside foot and as soon as I hit the corner I locked up the back wheel and flung the bike around, pushed off with my inside foot and kept going. I easily passed the guy in front of me, who tried to keep both feet clipped in. That felt good.
So now I am sitting fourth wheel. My legs feel great, my lungs feel great. We were all nice and compact so I decided to conserve a little energy and recover from the start until the group started to split a little or somebody caught us, and we ride the rest of the lap together. On the turn to the starting stretch, though, I had one of my ridiculous panic moments. These happen when I am taking a turn and suddenly panic thinking I am going to fall, even though I am nowhere near falling. Usually I tense up and just try to fight the panic, but this time I saw that I could take a nice wide line and just avoid the tense-ness, even though I saw a few rocks on that wide line. I take the wide line, hit the rocks real hard, bottom out both rims, and double flat my tires. I yell to Kendra to get my tool kit and ride to the pits which are fairly close, only brought one spare tube, so I try and patch one tire and replace the other tube, but the patch doesn't hold, so I pack my things up, change, watch a couple other races, then go home (after grabbing some pizza in Luray).
I got about 7 minutes of racing in. I felt really good, confident that I could have stuck with the front group another lap or two. Then disappointment. It is what it is. Next time. Still a great event at Luray, and you should check it out next year if you can.
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