We've ditched the kids with Nana, and both Tom and I are racing this weekend! Basically the whole plan is to see how close I can get to my mentor/idol/arch nemesis Christine over the weekend. :)
Race 1 - Street Sprint at Government Gardens: 15 checkpoints.
I've not done a sprint race before so I'm feeling a bit nervy as I line up in the race chute to get my map with 2 minutes until my allotted start time. Tom chooses this moment to come and have a chat and wish me luck, and later on I have to growl him for interrupting this precious planning time. The first three CPS are nice and spread, giving me a good chance to practise reading into the map and planning 4, 5, and 6, which I hit cleanly. I make a call to cut through a hotel courtyard from 6 to 7, and pass another rider here. Everything is dandy, a little nav wobble through the buildings around CP11, but nail the next couple only to kick myself when I realise CP14 is also CP 5 and I should have paid more attention to where it was! I can't remember it at all in the blur of the last few minutes but nav it ok anyway... except for the kerb which I hit quite hard. A few hundred metres and the bike is cornering awkwardly, a few more and I hear a strange noise, then I'm on my rims with my first flat tyre in 15 years. In a race. In a Bl&^^%y sprint race where every second counts. I lose my focus and go completely wrong to the last CP, the wrong way around the building, then have to run the last couple of hundred metres home in a huff. 23:48; 5th and three minutes slower than Christine - so she probably would have beaten me even without the flat, but I'm pleased to be within 'striking range'. ;) A highlight was Tom arriving soon after to find me with my bike upside down - after a debrief of my &*^%*&%*^ flat and my time, he looks down at his speedo and says "23 minutes, how did you do it that fast?". His own time was 28 minutes.
For the initiated, my husband is quite wonderful and I would say a talented cyclist. He has quads the size of tree trunks and spends a lot of time on his bike. So to beat him in a BIKE race?? YIPPEE! And it's also a reminder to me, that I have learned some things, and I'm actually navving ok. (From here I explained to him some basics of navving ahead rather than stopping after each checkpoint etc.)
Race 2 - Classic, 27km, Redwoods.
It's game on for the afternoon session with Christine starting 6 minutes behind me. I take off in a cloud of dust, certain this is my chance, and completely stuff it up before I even get to a checkpoint. 1 and 2 are within a few minutes of the start line, it's all too quick, I don't have my bearings and I goose it completely. Christine catches me at CP 3!!! (I later learned that she'd changed her start time and only started 2 minutes behind me, but at this stage I thought I'd lost 6 minutes in the first 5 and was toast!) I managed to hit the single trail up into the forest ahead of her and the rest of the session was catching glimpses of her at the turn-arounds, always chasing me, always on my tail. CP 5 was a tricky one on a really windy trail, with clear land showing you could cut through - but mis-judge where you cut and you have to ride right out on the one way track! I owned it, and as I clicked in saw Christine standing on the forest edge contemplating. Bike on shoulder, I tiptoed in the opposite direction until out of site before taking off. We talked later, and she had found the CP tricky, so my stealth mode was succesful! Thinking that I needed a 6 minute gap to beat her, I pushed with everything I had. I used all the tricks she'd taught me a few weeks earlier at the Great Forest Rogaine, I rode the roads rather than the trails, I took the yellow and white clearing short cuts, I rode up the roads and down the trails. I remembered not to bother with the supposed shortcut on Be Rude not 2 - and the rider I was with at this stage was surprised when I popped up ahead of him at the next CP having raced around the roads. I knew I had a bit of legs on her at hill climbing, so there was no rest for the wicked. My only memorable stuff up was catching up with a friend's dad, on his first race at the very final checkpoint. From there I headed into a blackberry dead end and had to turn back and repass him on his much better route! 2:05 finish which nabbed me second female! 14 mins ahead of Tom and 20 ahead of Christine, woohoo! :)
(Note: Overnight the Hambrook garage was echoing with the sounds of the mad inventor, and hey presto! Tom emerged in the morning with a rotating map board. I had to race competitively with a static map board for 3 years to 'earn' my spinning mapboard on my last birthday, he's done two races and says it's impossible to compete without one)
Race 3 - 2 hour Rogaine, Green Lake
Sour grapes - I didn't do that well in this race so I'm not going to play by play it. 6th female and Tom beat me! Learning points - look at the blimmen contour lines you egg!!!! If it's uphill it's going to be slow and may not be worth it!
