Echo, saved by Stans?

How can I begin to describe my 1^st Mt. bike race. Well it really started 3 days before, when I was gluing some super light tubless tires. Turns out the super lightweight tires are the Divas of the tire world, and don’t like to get pumped and filled with fluid (Stan’s fluid). I would fill them untill they were nice and tight, and Pssssss… a little pin hole bubble decides to pop, and release air… not such a big deal, all you have to do is shake some of the Stan’s fluid that is in them into the hole, then re-pump it up to pressure... Psssssss… I just repeated it about 40 times untill they finally held air over night. The next day on the 5 hour drive up to the race venue, and over night, my front tire the bigger Diva decided to deflate and pull away from the bead. No matter how furiously I flapped my little arms the floor pump couldn’t get the bead to reset. Long story short, I had to put a tube in it.

Ooook on to race day, did I mention it was my 1^st Mt. bike race ever, yeah well it was, and I was on brand new never ridden (Diva) tires, on a bike I had ridden maybe 3 hrs total.

We, the team, team Tensegrity + Ryan, got to Echo Red to Red, pulled up, and preceded to get ready and registered, bla bla bla, time for the preride. Off we ride up the windy road, following the windy racecourse, we veered off to the left onto a windy gravel road. Still windy, we cranked through the dust, and tumbleweeds. Blowing past bikers slung along the wayside, soon realizing that the tumbleweeds we were riding through were hiding, not so tiny two pronged, thorns (we call goat heads). Fearing for the lives of our tubes we furiously turned around and started tearing back through the goat head minefield, trying to avoid a pre race flat… Ethan’s tire went down, nothing we could do, leave him behind, the rest of us made it out unscathed, or so I thought.

Pulling up to the line I B.S.ed with a couple of the other guys trying to blow off some pre race excitement. I just happened to look down and I see a huge goat head chewing into my front tire… do I pull It? No time to change a flat… Awe F it… I pulled it, Psssss… but, hear comes my big but, but it turns out all the Stan’s fluid I left in the tire worked even though I had a tube in it, it sealed itself up. The rolling start begins. Cruising up the road I go, BAM, someone’s tire blows… They limp to the side of the road, Bam another down. We push on, down the gravel road, we turn right into a field, and then onto some single track, turns out it was not just windy but dusty too. I start passing people on the up hills, and try not to cry in terror, on the downhills, tricking myself into thinking my tears are from the wind. After pumping down the trail for a while, happy my tires are holding as I pass others stopped with flats. I see a fly over in the distance,

(a large wooden bridge over a second trail, set up to allow two riders/trails to cross simultaneously without running into each other). I approach, seeing a line of people piled up failing to ride over it. I think to myself I remember this game from cross, so I just shoulder my bike and run past everyone up to the top, hop skip and a jump back on my bike, landing lightly on the saddle. Ha ha eat my dust; you all suck (isn’t what I’m thinking of the 5 riders I just passed). This couldn’t be going better. Wait, my shoes failed to clip in. Turns out using brand new shoes means my cleat position is different. Screaming down this man made deathtrap, I bottom out no feet on the pedals, suddenly I’m sitting back on my bike, like I’m popping a wheelie.

I stop, thinking that my seat post has dropped. It’s still in it same spot, but me seat is pointing at the sky, in what I can only assume is an attempt to let me know who is punishing me for my greed. I bust out my multi-tool, and attempt to adjust my seat. I see the rails are bent and there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it. I raise my seat a bit, grab a granola bar out of my pocket, and jump back on my bike.

I’m annoyed as I start catching and passing people I have already passed. I keep pushing hard, I crest the top of a hill, expecting a nice well-deserved rest, only to be beat down by the steady battering ram of the Eastern Oregon winds. I do everything I can to keep pedaling and stay in the single track. I snake along the trail sometimes leaning sideways into the wind so far it looked like I'm leaning through a corner even when I'm going strait. I was doing great again, passing people on the up hill, and holding on for dear life trying not to die on the downhill. Ha I’m dominating these people. Clunk, clunk, clunk, I started to feel my back rim hitting as I road over rocks, it was going flat. I pushed on until it started to burp air; I stopped and whipped out a co2 charge, to pump it up. I connect the two pieces and hook it up to my tire… nothings happening… I try looking for a button or something to release the gas… I see nothing, I push and bend it to no avail… it must be a dud, so I start to untwist the charge from the adapter, and PSSSSSST, IT WORKS, I’m a dumb ass. Off I go again, passing people, some for the 3^rd time. I’m not so annoyed at this point because I assume my race is over due to the punishment by the lord for my callous pageantry.

I push on, I run into the far end of the gravel road, one big hill left, then a flat cruise to the finish line. I laugh as I see people up the hill walking their bikes or slowly spinning in their granny gear. I can pass everyone here. I jump up and start my out of the saddle grind. My back tire is slipping, and my legs are failing… maybe half way up, defeated, I slip into my granny gear, and slowly spin my way to the top, with everyone else. As I crest the top of the hill, my temples pumping out of my skull, ready for

the flats to catch my breath, I hit the wind again… the damn wind that I forgot about. Even with the wind I’m finally able to catch my breath, I notice some of the Cat 1’s in the field to behind me to my right, they are destroying the field, pace lining through the wind making us cat3s, 2s, and clydesdales look like we are standing still. I can see in the distance where we will meet, so I punch into the wind. I just barely make it to the intersection in time to jump on the back of their pace line. I try to hang on while the guys fly up the gravel road. They keep switching back and forth cutting the wind for each other, while I feel like a bitch just sitting back trying to catch my breath again. Finally we hit the road, and I figure I should at least try to be something other than a parasite, so I crank into the big ring (of my 3x9), and drop the hammer into the front, I say something cool like, “I’m a bad ass Cat 3 see if you Cat 1 bitches can keep up, aaah ha ha”, as I burn rubber and speed away. Ok what really happened was I said “jump on, I’ll pull you as long as I can”, and I did. I pulled for a good 3/4^th of a mile thinking I may be able to beat these guys to the finish, only to have them sprint past me in the last 400m like I was standing still (reverse breakaway).

All and all, I felt good about the race, turned out I got 2^nd in my age/division, so that was good.