Norba National
Boerne, TX
March 4-6th, 2005

Hard to believe the first race of the season was almost three weeks ago. Time is moving quickly and now the first day of spring has arrived. Our posse of cross country racers descended on the small town of Boerne, TX the first weekend of March. Boerne is about thirty minutes outside of San Antonio. We were all expecting a hot, dry, and dusty weekend of racing. Mother Nature, however, had other plans and turned the hot, dry, and dusty into a cold, clammy, and muddy weekend of racing. The last time I saw the sun was at the Colorado Springs airport as I was leaving town.

The race venue was at the Tapatillo Springs Resort; a very expensive golf club resort in what Texans call the hill country. There was a collegiate golf tournament going on at the same time and I’m sure the golfers were a little confused by all the muddy cyclists riding around. Not your typical venue for a bike race.

The event was a stage race; time trial, short track, and cross country. You get a finishing time for each event. At the end of the weekend the rider with the fastest time from the three days is the overall winner. You have to finish each stage to be able to race the next day. Stage racing is a lot more common in road racing than mountain biking. It’s always a challenge because you have to be good at not only racing, but recovering i.e. eating and drinking, to be able to perform well day after day.

The time trail was on Friday. A short three mile loop. The area around Tapatillo Springs is all limestone, and because of the light rain that day the course was slick. The course started with a short downhill that led into the biggest climb on the loop; a three minute lung buster. The rest of the loop was rolling terrain and one flooded wash of water about 8 inches deep. Made for some great pictures. I started second to last based on my overall finish in last year’s Norba series. After the first climb I knew that I was in for a long three miles. The legs didn’t have enough go go juice and I suffered. Twelve minutes never seemed so long. I ended up 13th. Yikes!

Trying to quickly forget the time trial I focused on my specialty, the short track event on Saturday. The course had a long hard climb followed by a fun downhill on the grassy slopes of the golf course. We had another stream crossing that was enough to make the bikes all muddy. I was hoping for a better day but it was not to be. I hung with the leaders for about half the race and then fell off the group. My legs imploded, abandoning me in my time of need. I finished 8th I think. Nothing to be excited about.

On to Sunday. It started raining around 3pm Saturday and didn’t stop until Sunday morning. The course turned into a quagmire of thick peanut butter mud. You’d think after seven years of mountain bike racing I’d know what tires to use in these kinds of conditions, but alas I made a huge mistake and went with a larger 2.1 aggressive tire. All of my teammates made the same mistake. The course was extremely rocky and we figured that a small mud tire would be too risky. I also chose to ride my full suspension bike. It was great on all the rocky sections, but the mud clearance wasn’t very good. That, coupled with the larger tires made for a frustrating day.

I felt great for the first ten minutes of the race. The legs were finally back to their old selves and I was charging hard in third place. Then we hit the first climb. The trail quickly disintegrated into a thick, slippery, barely rideable rut. I came to a grinding halt. I picked up my bike, which now weighed over 40 lbs, and tried to spin the wheels. There was so much mud on the tires and frame that the wheels didn’t move. I spent the next few minutes trying to scrape the muck off the wheels and frame. I half pushed, half dragged my bike up the rest of the climb. Up on top the trail became technical and quite rocky. Once I got the mud cleared out I had a great time riding all the rocky sections on the full suspension bike. Unfortunately the course wasn’t all rocky. There were other sections of unrideable muck. I spent a good part of the race on and off my bike trying to keep the wheels rolling and the drive train (chain and gears) working. I rode through all the standing water I could find just to try and keep the bike clear of mud. It was futile.

And this was only the first lap. I had to do it all again on the second lap. There came a point when I was no longer racing. I was just trying to survive and get to the finish line. One of those epic days you laugh about. I don’t even know where I finished. Somehow the bike kept working and I was able to salvage a less than stellar weekend. A lot of people dropped out that day. Sometimes I wonder why I wasn’t one of them. Haha!

After changing into dry clothes and getting some food in me, I spent a half hour washing my racing clothes in the creek that ran through the venue. It’s the only way to get anything clean, and also keeps the washing machine from getting ruined. The weekend was finally over and I think we were all happy to leave. And of course the sun was shinning when I arrived in Colorado Springs. Yippee!!

Our next adventure is in Phoenix, AZ. If it’s not hot and dry in Phoenix I think I’ll boycott the race. Until then….

Alison

The ever so painful short track event.

What a muddy mess!