Masters of the mountains 1

June 11, 2006. Placed 13th in a field of 20 in the Masters of the Mountains race at the Winter Clove in at Round Top. I wish I could do better. I was 30 minutes off of first place. Ugh. I did meet my goals, though, so I am happy. I just can't beleive how much faster people are than I am.
I passed one guy in my class (Brett?) about 300 yards before the finish line, and another guy from my class (Django) sprinted to catch me at the end, but I sprinted and beat him by a nose. In the standings, they gave me a 10 second lead over him. I stayed after and watched Terry, Brynna and Doug. Brynna was on the tail of another woman in her class for the first 3 laps, but when I last saw her she was about 18 seconds back. I also saw a pro rider who asked how far ahead the guy in first was, I told him about 90 seconds but didin't bother to tell him that the guy had done the climb he was riding in his middle ring and not the granny gear :-).
Course description: It started on a short but steep and soft (pine needles) uphill that separated the pack. Then around a turn, on the road and then back into the woods for a short, steep drop followed by a long climb, including a section along a small ridge line. Beutiful, but a little scary. After the climb, the reward is a fast, rocky descent with only a few turns, which bottomed out at a stream with a tough little bump to get back out. I pre-rode it and figured out to just hit it fast and be in the granny gear on the approach. It worked great, and I climbed it every time except the last time when I was too tired to do much of anything. Coming out of the stream was the long, hard slog. It was a long uphill that just kept getting muddier the more you went. Finally, the mud would get so thick you just had to get off and haul your bike for about 200 yards. On the first lap and the preride you could ride this section, but by the time I hit the second it was impassable. I went and watched the pros ride it and they were walking it, too. Not much of a reward for this section. A short drop and then a climb back out to the road and to the "8th hole" which was an impossibly steep climb. Well, not impossible. I'm disappointed I didn't ride it. On the preride I made it past the root only to hit a rock and slip out. I should have been able to climb it. After that there was a nice long double-track descent with a couple of turns, but not much technical about it.
Thanks to Doug for the photo!