4 down 4 to go

Preparation for the next race starts as soon as you cross the finish line - It'll be a miracle if I can pull off 8 weekends in a row of racing.  Probably not the smartest, but its whats on tap.  4 down after this weekend.  Sunburst, Ore To Shore, Franklin, & Suamico.  Up next Grand Junction, Lk Geneva, Chequamegon, & China?  Yup China!  More details to come on that one...so first its Sumaico.

The weekend started like most - cleaning up the bikes from the previous weekend.  It was nice.  Just me and Oscor hanging out in the front yard on a perfect day making some bikes shine.  Not much looks nice than a freshly cleaned Shimano drive.

Current WORS Champs passing down knowledge!

Saturday morning we hit up the Farmers Market before heading up to Green Bay to coach the WIN high school mtb clinic.  Pretty awesome so see 21 kids registered and amped up on MTB racing.  Can't wait to see how WIN plays out over the next few years.  It for sure is going to up the level of WORS competition.

We did an hour of skills and drills and then headed out on the course for a pre-ride, talked tactics, and tackled a few tricky sections on the course.  All in all a great day. 

Sunday it was another trip up to GB for the WORS race, but overnight somebody plugged in the hair dryer and forgot to turn it off.  There was a stiff wind blowing from the West bringing in some pretty warm air.  Unfortunately the course was pretty wooded and there was no air flow back in the woods.  It was sweltering.  With the heat and a big race next weekend I wasn't eager to go all in on lap number one.

Cole took off in the first singletrack, but Nathan jumped between us and Cole was riding away.  I didn't feel quite as good on my bike as the previous weekend and even stopped during the first lap to try and let some tire pressure out.  It helped a little but not a ton.  After a lap Cole was up 1:30 and I went to the front to start to close things down.  I whittled the group down to just Tristan, Tyler, and Darrin, but only took about 15 seconds out of Cole's lead.  I got a little help from the other guys, but every time they went to the front the pace slowed a little too much.

Starting lap 3 I hit it pretty hard into the first bumpy singletrack and it was down to just Tristan and I chasing Cole.  About half way thru the lap somebody yelled something about Cole, but it was really mumbled and Tristan and I both missed it...turns out it might have been key.

Tristan and I were both suffering a little and just wanted to make it to the finish and jump in a lake, my hands were hot, my feet were hot, and my head was hot although I wasn't cramping at all.  I kept on the gas and felt little gaps opening, but only to be closed due to lapped traffic.  Finally at the end I had a little gap and realized Tristan was happy with following me to the line.  I think it was enough for him to wrap up the overall points series.  Little did we know that Cole had crashed out and we were battling for the win.  Its not often that you cross the line in first and have no idea you won until 20 or 30 minutes later.  Oh well....

Time to go clean the bikes again...they look about as nasty as my legs did at the finish.  Another solid race for Andrea in 4th.  Just lost out on the sprint for 3rd.  Next up The Grand 40!  Big Thanks to XTRPhoto.com for taking some great pictures of the WIN Clinic and all the WORS races.