Saturday, March 10, 2012

MTB Race



It's about time for an update on life and training, part 1 haha. There have been a lot of highs and some lows lately. First and foremost, I raced! On my mountain bike! It was awesome!

The race was a 9+mile all uphill time trial with a few thousand+ feet of climbing. Hello pain cave. I'd post the garmin course profile, but it's not that exciting--just one big ass uphill. Apparently not too many people were chompin at the bit to do this. Only nine girls (including myself and my mom) showed up, most were pro, and probably 60-something dudes. I was out of my element to say the least but I didn't give a crap, this was about fun and trying something new. Thankfully I saw some friendly faces there!

Racing MTB is so different, for example, taking in nutrition is tough because, personally, I don't like taking either hand off the handlebars at any time when riding at such an extreme intensity in sketchy terrain. So I carried a camelback, which apparently isn't "cool" but it worked for me. In there I was using Skratch Labs drink mix, which was perfect-o and easy on my tummy with all that jostling around. (Try this stuff if you haven't!)

My goal was to go sub-1:30 based off a slower time I did in a practice ride. End result was a 1:29. Cuttin it close! A lot slower than the pro ladies, but it was right on target to my goal. I'll go faster next time.

As a side note, a few people asked me why I'd pay $60 something to do this race on a trail that I can ride on for free any other day of the week. Well here ya go: Besides just having the urge to jump into a race, I like supporting the smaller races and usually these ones are where you get treated very well. For example, with entry we got a $20 gift certificate to a bike shop (can always use that!), and in the post-race awards/raffle event, I won a $100 gift certificate as well... in fact, I'd say almost half the people who showed up to awards won something.

I won something else too... a very unique award... only one person out of the whole race got this particular award and the trophy was embarrassingly huge, bigger than any other that was given out...

The Sportsmanship Award
I'm still not exactly sure why I got this award--guess I'm a "good sport" even when grimacing in pain? Regardless, it's a nice gesture and cool that a race would want to do something like this.

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OK, that's it for now! Time to go hop on the elliptical. Yes, my friends, no running. It looks like I'm potentially dealing with a torn meniscus. What a blow to the season, at least the first half... but we're optimistic because there's a lot I still can do.

5 comments:

  1. Great job on your MTB race and your results. You are brave to go out there and tackle such a demanding event.

    I am sorry for your injury. I hope you heal very quickly!

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  2. The sportsmanship award: given to the slowest rider who can still smile after more than 60 minutes of zone 4

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  3. Thanks Anon. I know I wasn't the slowest one overall, so does that mean I was the only one who was still able to smile of the "slow people" haha?

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  4. That trophy is awesome!

    I rode (not raced) my MTB this past weekend too out on the san juan trail. Man, I love that ride!

    Glad to hear things are going well Tawnee!

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  5. Sorry about that, I meant it as the person who is smiling not because they're winning but that their having a really good time.
    love your blog and your podcast. keep up the awesome work!!

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