DFL Race 2

DFL Race 2 050914

Holy Crap! This 'cross course was about the most fun and toughest I can recall. Lot's of really fast bumpy singletrack and lots of climbing! After doing intevals at cross practice on Tuesday and then sleeping about 5hrs that nite, I wasn't quite sure how my legs were gonna feel for the Weds nite race. Well, sure enough, I got about a 5 minute warm up and then it was time to start. Of course we're in the City, so it's windy as hell and the warm up quickly dissipates as I stand at the starting line amongst at least 40 people.

Anywho, we start off on a paved climb, thru some bramble, onto a paved flat, then a hard left onto a bumpy, climbing singletrack, to short steep climb, to a run up, which was like a rocky little krag you had to be careful running up. NORBA and UCI would so not approve and that makes me love the course even more.

Anywho, the next little descent is rocky, followed by some bumpy grass lined singletrac, then a hard left on to a short paved section and then down another super fast, super bumpy singletrack into another hard left hander.

Just as your hands, arms and blurred vision have recovered, you hit the bumpiest fastest singletrack descent that lead you into a paved climb. You pop off the paved climb by making a right onto a singletrack\doubletrack under Eucalyptus looking trees. You then wind up this trail and then into a quick little descent and over a big log, plop into a loose dirt section, which I choose to run, because in about 20 ft there was another big log to pop over. Over the second log, run down a steep little descent onto the pavement and hop back on the bike.

Pedal, pedal, hard left onto a fireroad, pick up too much speed, almost wipe out trying to slow down to hop over the double barrier composed of metal rods about knee high, sprint down the fireroad and then you pop out onto the paved start, which BTW is into a right hand lane of a two lane road. Fortunatly there wasn't much traffic, although on one of the laps I did have to call up to the guy in back of me, that there was a car coming...so sketchy...I love it.

Anywho, after suffering thru the first lap and thinkin', god what the f*ck am I doing out here, my legs warmed up and the second lap hurt a bit less and then I settled into a groove for the remainder of the laps...all 45minutes worth. Attack, attack, recover, attack, attack, recover, this worked well as I managed to work my way up to some of the leaders. Once I got into a decent position, I just focus on my pedaling, dismount\remount techniuqe and tried to hold my placement in the pack. This worked well, as one of the fast guys I was following never managed to pull away from me.

I think I finished somewhere in the top 10...damn the leaders are fast. The fact that I can sortuv hang with them, gives me some hope that I won't be getting lapped racin' in the A's this year....that is of course until the pros show up at the UCI races!

Another great race put on by the DFL team...oh and I love the new Mango juice that they added to the assortment of post-race beverages....lot's of good carbs to help recovery!

God I love the pure anaerobic bliss of 'cross! Rock on !

Cheers,
Isaias
Our pretty pals over at Roaring Mouse (Tim, Paule and Julie)