Windham Pro XCT - Fun With Friends and Epic Finish Failure

I’ve been rather busy in the past couple of weeks, and I now have a backlog of things to talk about.  Rather than put up one ridiculously long post, I’ll do you a favor and do 3 separate posts because I’m nice like that.   

Windham Pro XCT

I held off from writing about this right away for a couple of reasons:
1.     I was really busy.
2.     I was disappointed.
3.     I was trying to focus on the next race (more to come on that shortly…).

The overall experience Windham weekend experience was first-class.  I met up with my teammate, DAS on Friday because races were Saturday, and it’s a three-hour drive from Danielson to Windham.  We made good time, and arrived at the mountain shortly before 2pm – almost at the exact same time as our Death Row Velo buddy, Gary.  Tracy had arrived about an hour or so before us. 

Priority number 1 was to pre-ride the course, and it was easy to see that there were no major changes from last year.  There was certainly no less climbing than in previous years.  Because they’ve used it as a World Cup race course, it’s really well designed.  The rock gardens are laid out well, and there are some bridges and other slightly technical features. 

Probably the most challenging section is called the “Mini Wall” – a reasonably steep exceptionally rooty downhill with a sharp left hand turn at the end. Previous years had left that section super loose and dry which was scary enough, but this year the rain made it muddy and almost unrideable.  Notice I said almost. 

All-in-all, the course looked good, and I wasn’t worried about racing on it… I was just worried about who I was racing against.  I’ll get to that…  

After checking in at registration, I found out that my super-d registration included a weekend-long lift ticket so that I could practice the super-d course.  As it turned out, this was both good and bad.  Seeing the course ahead of time reassured me that it could be done on my hard-tail, but the course was extremely muddy at the topmost part of the mountain so I got my bike pretty dirty in the process.

The other plus-side of the lift ticket was that I was able to talk John and Gary into racing the super-d as well.  I don’t think it was that hard of a decision…  A race where all you have to do is ride up to the top of a mountain on a ski lift and then come down some super sick trails?  Who wouldn’t?

After some cleanup and dumping our stuff off at our motel room (the Windham Inn at Johnny O’Connors), we set out in search of food.  Without any argument, we settled on Cave Mountain Brewery.  I don’t remember what everyone ate, but I’m pretty sure we all had at least one beer.  However, we noticed they had a stout float on their dessert menu, and that foretold where we would eat dinner on Saturday night as well.

Like the dedicated cyclists we all are, we had lights out by 10pm – John and Gary had a start time of 8am, and we all wanted enough time to get the easy-up tent set up before the races began.  Plus, we had the bright idea to cook eggs and stuff on a camp-stove and make French-pressed coffee…  as you can probably guess, we didn’t do that the following morning. 

Race day was all sorts of exciting, and the weather was gorgeous; both of the guys had a good race. Tracy was up next, and she looked really strong out there.  My race was midday at 1pm…

…What’s cool about my race is that instead of racing at the same time as all the other cat 1 men and women, the pro women had their very own race time.  I guess this is how they do things in the big leagues. 

So, lining up at the start of this race was a bit surreal.  Not only was I standing next to some of the fastest women in North America, but I got to have my name called as I made my way up to the line – super exhilarating. 

Here’s how the race went down:

• ·      First 3 laps, the legs felt heavy and tired, but I rode pretty much everything - even the sketchy mini wall. 
• ·      Last lap, I started to feel like I wanted to be there, and I started pushing it.  Unfortunately, it was too late.  At the top of the last climb, I heard the motorcycle that rides in front of the leader. 
• ·      Before the race, we were told if we got lapped by the leader, we would have to pull ourselves.  So, I knew I’d have to do that.
• ·      Shortly after Lea Davison passed me, my left contact lens ejected itself from my eyeball.
• ·      I had to walk the mini wall on because I couldn’t see a damn thing.
• ·      I didn’t know where I was supposed to go since I’d gotten lapped.  In the other UCI races I’d done, we weren’t supposed to go through the start/finish area if we got lapped by the leader.
• ·      I pulled off the course just before the final straightaway so it wouldn’t look like I was in second place and immediately reported to the officials.
• ·      I had worked really hard on lap 4 to get a good gap on two other riders, and succeeded.
• ·      I couldn’t find the results posted anywhere and had to get ready for the super d and find some food.
• ·      I found out two days later that I got recorded as DNF – even thought they told us we were supposed to pull ourselves if we got lapped, and even though I reported to them immediately.  
• ·      Next time, I will ride through the start/finish area pretending like I’m second.

Needless to say, Windham was fun, but the whole organization aspect of the race, with the UCI and their confusing rules, was not so much fun. 

The super d was a new experience.  It was a bit unorganized and weird, but after riding the lift up and
hanging out for a bit at the top of the mountain, we lined our bikes up, walked back about 20-30 feet, and waited to be told to start.  Then we ran to our bikes, hopped on, and raced to the bottom of the mountain. 

I think it took about 10 minutes or so…  I don’t really know.  There was no timing system; they just marked us down in order of how we finished.  It was funny – some women were decked out like downhillers, some were on hardtails, and some were a bit in between.  Appearance meant nothing when it came to rider ability.  Apparently, I got 5^th out of however many of us there were. 

Another problem I ran into had to do with my bike…  somehow, the xc race messed with my front derailleur, and I couldn’t get my chain to stay on the big ring for the super d.  I suppose there could have been worse problems – like for instance, getting a DNF when you actually did not DNF.  

The day got wrapped up with another trip back to the brewery.  I had two delicious glasses of their chocolate hazelnut porter (and bought a growler of it to take home), and the guys got their stout beer floats.  Because of my dairy issues (migraines), I didn’t order one, but I had a taste…  holy shit, that’s good stuff. 

There was talk of riding somewhere nearby in the morning, but with my bike all dysfunctional, I told everyone I was out.  Rather than leave me to my own devices, everyone else decided to just head out in the morning too.  So that was it.  Homebound. 

My plan for the week was to only do a few rides, and I was starting my new job, starting summer school, and throwing a July 4^th party – all before heading to Maryland after work on Saturday so I could do a 100 mile race on Sunday at 6 am on what was touted to be the hardest 100 mile course in the U.S.