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Monday, March 23, 2009

lost valley and other things

it turned out to be a stellar sunday for racing bikes. i loaded up the freestyle and headed to lost valley where the gorc crew and matt j have been doing wonders for the last couple of years. this year was no exception.

it was a nice turnout, having over 30 experts total (17 young'uns, 13 old guys, and 3 women, i think). it was a nice surprise. it was also nice to see my old bar banging buddy, john matthews with a number on his bike! after a completely gut wrenching start (aren't all mtn bike races that way?) we dove into the new single track and drj's own bob arnold led john and i away from the field. we extended the lead once we hit the gravel. whoa, john can ride singletrack! we began to pick off the younger experts pretty quick, and we settled into a nice pace. by the end of the second lap, it was just john and i. oh, man, i can't tell you how many races over the last 15 years have been like this! sadly, i couldn't take it to the line with him. he had good legs, and i cramped the living daylights out of my left quad and hamstring. i watched him pedal away. grrrr. second place it was, then.

i was spurred on in my second lap by well wishers, which i'm always grateful for. not the least of which was the kakouris family. they drove all the way out to weldon spring to watch me go by twice. now THAT'S dedication. the kids had a lot of fun afterward throwing things at each other and undoubtedly pissing off some of the spectators. sorry about that.

not bad, but room for improvement.

3 comments:

Rich K said...

hey, great job out there. so what kind of kit are you wearing nowadays........dogfish again???

Casey Ryback said...

dude - wish I could have been able to stick around and watch the show, sounds like it was an fun time!

Pedal Brake Pedal by TK said...

rich, i was wearing the cannondale speed ball kit. (sorry, chris). it was quite loud. it was a fun time duking it out!