The course was on the Pemberton loop at McDowell Mountain Park. Starting out with 6.4 miles of a steady, gradual climb leading into a ripping and flowy downhill that turns flat towards the end of the lap and brings it back to the start/finish totaling 15.5 miles.
Here's a look at the course:
http://app.strava.com/segments/842236
The idea of going to this race started when my buddy Jason Downing and I were on a ride together and he suggested that we do the race together as a duo and I decided to race with him. About 3 or 4 weeks later, it was the day before the race and I had a lot to get done. I spent part of my morning shopping for race food which included several varieties of fruits and leafy vegetables, lunch meat, greek yogurt and some applesauce. With having that and several other things to do that day, I found myself hungry and unable to find the time to sit down and find out exactly what I should eat before the race, or even just to sit down and eat anything. By about 7:30 PM I finally got some food in me aside from a few bananas I had that morning, which was a few slices of pizza; not bad due to the fat and carb content but not ideal either. This also caused me to delay my opener. At about 9:45 PM I got to my opener and was home and eating some pasta by 10:45. By about 12:00 AM I finished getting packed up and could finally make my way to bed only to be waking up at 4:45 AM the next morning. I had some trouble getting to sleep that night as well to add on to my inconvenience and finally fell asleep at around 2:00 AM. When 4:45 AM rolled around, I got up, and got ready to head out taking a few pieces of toast with me to eat on the way to the course.
Upon getting to the race course, there was another addition to my inconveniences--mostly all fault of my own--I was too late getting situated into the venue to get a proper warmup in. Before I knew it, I was on the line next to two of my buddies, Mimmo Futia and Zach Keller along with a big time road pro, Eric Marcotte. When the race started, I expected a harder start than we had. I hadn't figured that the race having started on a paved road, that it would have more of a road racing kind of start; much easier than a mountain bike racing start like I had anticipated. A few seconds after going off, I saw Zach and Eric pushing the pace on the front just to my right, I decided that I felt good, and would attempt to make a big attack on the two of them and pick up the pace of the group as a whole. This did not end well for me. Some time after picking up the pace, I looked back to see if I could catch a draft on somebody nearby but the next closest person was about half a mile away, at this point, I just had to wait and do as much recovery as I could before they caught up. Everybody caught back up and I caught the first draft I could. I got lucky and was still seated in a good position all the way up into the singletrack entrance. The climb at the beginning was draining me as I watched Eric and Zach pull away from everybody, I still had it in my head that I could possibly catch up. After almost blowing up a second time, I decided to settle into a pace, catch a draft and wait for the downhill. I caught a nice draft off a tall and fast guy. Perfect for my situation. I held onto him until about the 6 mile mark, just .4 miles out from the top of the climb. On the downhill, I was thankful to slamming a hard pace. I found myself drafting off of one of Jason's Vitesse teammates until I hit a corner too wide and he pulled away. I found myself alone on the rest of the lap, found Jason by the exchange tent and tagged him for his lap. Afterwards, I went back to our tent to hook up on my Compex EMS system and drink some Hammer Nutrition Recoverite to get ready for the next lap
Just before starting lap 2, about 1 minute before Jason's expected time, I was faced with an issue, I somehow lost a bolt out of my right cleat and was permanently locked into that pedal for the entire lap among several other problems it caused. I saw another buddy of mine, Matt Connors who was racing solo, go by. We talked for a little bit until he motored off past me. I found myself alone for most of this lap, with the exception of a guy who was sucking on my wheel the whole descent. This time around the descent was somewhat of an issue. With my cleat being held in by one bolt, half of it would slide down to the lowest setting on my shoe, while the other half stayed on the setting I had it in whenever I hit anything with my rear wheel causing me to have to slide it back in with my foot. I dealt with this for the rest of the lap and still managed to drop The guy that was hanging on my wheel. After coming in and tagging Jason in, I surprisingly found an awesome guy named Jay from Team Vitesse who helped me out and gave me a spare cleat bolt he happened to have laying around.
Lap number 3 was hard. Pain was starting to settle in and the climb started to feel a little harder than before. On the climb, the second place duo team took first from us. Their guy that was out at the moment was Bob LaRoche. Bob and I knew each other from racing a short track series during the summer called Short Track at Papago. He told me to not let 2 old guys beat us. I tried to hold him and not let go. I held him for about 2 minutes until he went off. I spent the rest of my lap in a vain effort of trying to catch up. I did everything I could, even maxed out my gears to hit a top speed of 32 mph on the descent. I railed every corner much faster than I would have if I were at a normal race pace and took risks where I could. I did not let up one bit. Once I came to the flat section leading into the start/finish, I let up a bit and just tried to not blow up making my way back to the start/finish. After this, I also saw our AZ Devo team director, Marty Coplea who was bravely racing solo and was still looking strong after several laps!
Lap 4 I truly understood why people said duo was the hardest race. Just enough time for your legs to cease up and going right into the climb didn't help much. I really needed a draft and my prayers were answered in a good and not so good way; I caught a draft from the guy that was on the third place team just behind us. I realized that I could treat this lap like a XC race. I held on to his wheel for the whole climb and a little bit going into the downhill. After trying to drop me several times, he looked back and expected me to take a pull. This was where my XC racing tactics came into play. I pulled him on the downhill for about 1 minute, just enough time for him to think that I was going to pull him around but not enough time for him to get any kind of recovery from me. Then I made a hard attack on him. He picked up quickly though. I got caught up with another guy who seemed to be pushing about the same pace we were. This made things interesting. Each of us wanted to just get out and beat the other guys on the lap but nobody wanted to take a pull. I found myself off the front until I went a little too hard into a corner coming off of the downhill and into the flat section and almost made the 3 of us get into a big crash. After that, I wasn't sure what happened, but I found myself alone with the guy that we had caught. I had successfully gotten rid of the 3rd place team's guy. I just held in his draft for the rest of the lap and tagged Jason in for his next lap. After this lap I was getting pretty tired. I cleaned off my legs, set up the electrodes, hooked up the Compex and just fell asleep for about 30 minutes.
Lap 5 I felt decent for. Better than I did for lap 4. I knew this would most likely be my last lap. I went decently hard on the climb for having done 4 laps already. I just wanted to get to the downhill. Once I hit the 6.4 mile mark, I started to go for it. I hit the downhill as hard as I could, spent everything I had left. My hamstrings were killing me, much more than my quads and those hurt too. I kept thinking I saw Bob up in the distance but I didn't. I slammed it all the way to where I could tag Jason to take the last lap. I knew at this point I was done and glad for it!
After I finished, I went over to get my long awaited free tacos from Chipotle who were giving them away at the race as the event sponsor. Then I finally went around the venue and said hi to a few old friends, then before I knew it, it was right about time for Jason to come in for our 10th and last lap as a team. We had a great time and a great race out there!
A special thank you to Hammer Nutrition for the mixture of HEED, Endurolytes, Endurolytes Fizz tablets and Race Caps. Also for my Compex unit that kept me going lap after lap.
A special thank you to Stan's Notubes for my stupid light Race Gold 29er wheels.
And one more shout out to Triggerpoint Therapy for my Quadballer that also kept me going lap after lap.
A few thanks for support in the event:
First and foremost, my duo partner, Jason Downing who was doing incredible laps the whole race and Team Vitesse and AZ Devo for helping support Jason and I for this event. I would also like to thank my dad for supporting Jason and I. Lastly, I would like to thank my coach, Brad Wilhelm for helping me get to the level I needed to achieve a podium finish with Jason at this race.
I would also like to thank the rest of my sponsors for their support and incredible products:
Trek
Bontrager
Hammer Nutrition
Bicycle Ranch
Shimano
Genuine Innovations
Feedback Sports
Squirt Lube
The Mountain Bike Association of Arizona
Stan's Notubes
ESI Grips
Triggerpoint Therapy
Baja Designs
Bontrager
Hammer Nutrition
Bicycle Ranch
Shimano
Genuine Innovations
Feedback Sports
Squirt Lube
The Mountain Bike Association of Arizona
Stan's Notubes
ESI Grips
Triggerpoint Therapy
Baja Designs
