WT: Winding Trails or Wicked Terrible? an exercise in pedaling through gritty pudding

We needed the rain.  I've been wishing for it for the past two weeks, but on race day?  I wouldn't have minded a little less of it until my race was over, and the amount we had for the first lap was actually beneficial to the course.

Winding Trails has come a long way as a race venue in the past 5 years.  It isn't my favorite course because there is nothing technical about it, but it's fast and fun.  The sections of single track that they've incorporated over the years are tight and twisty, which means you have to plan your passing for the fire road sections or else hang on through the single track and hope the person in front of you isn't going to do something dangerous (like hit one of the very nearby trees - easily done in fast and/or slippery conditions).

The first lap was insanely fast and the traction was prime.  I had a good start, for once, and stayed with the rest of the girls for a bit.  In fact, after the first lap, I could still see two of girls ahead of me.  The other two were already taking a good lead.  I barely used my brakes except to avoid cornering into a couple of trees, but the fire road sections were awesome because there was no need to slow down.  The climbs felt great.  None of them were anything worth really calling a hill, but I can remember being really out of shape a few years ago and suffering out there.  This time I felt strong and fired up.

By lap two, though, the course was starting to grow soupy.  I was immediately reminded of how crappy a Renegade tire is, and that's what I still had on the back of my bike.  (All of the tires that I want are currently out of stock, so I'm not-so-patiently waiting for one right now).  Anyhow, the loss of traction turned me into a granny out there.  By lap 3 and 4, I was getting accustomed to the slipping and sliding, so I rode a lot more recklessly, but I think my poor performance on lap 2 was probably a really bad thing. During lap 3, I had been reeling in the 4th place girl, it had me motivated, but when I finally caught her, she was getting off her bike to drop out.  She said she had no brakes left, and I was really bummed.  It's tough to motivate yourself to try to catch back up to people you can't even see.  The only thing that was motivating me after that was the thought of keeping the Cat 1 girls off my back.  I'd already been passed by one, and I didn't want Susan Lynch to beat my time again (she is kick-ass awesome, but I need to be faster than her for self-esteem reasons).  My other motivating factor was getting myself warm.  I couldn't feel my feet, and my thumbs were so numb that I was having trouble shifting; my bike wasn't shifting well as it was because of all the grime caked into the chain.

I'm chalking this race up to another learning experience.  I wanted to quit, for sure.  It was soooo cold out there, and absolutely miserable, but finishing was a must.  Also, I think the fact that I've called that race course a wuss course so many times is the reason that it rained so much.  It's all my fault, I tell you, and I'm sorry.  I will try not to call a race course easy ever again if that means it will refrain from becoming covered in gritty pudding.

I should also add that because I was so cold and wet, I only drank a half a bottle of liquid the entire 2 hours.  Fail.