Hillbilly's report race #1 and #2

Race #1

Conyers GA. Horse Park Oct 21st 07 Arrived the day before and pre-rode the course enough to get the turns and barriers in my mind. Next morning got to the venue, did a couple laps of warm up, got the camera ready and lined up on the front row with the usual suspects and some new faces to the 45 + crowd.The whistle blew and off we went, was not anxious to go hard from the gun and was happy to see that everyone else must have felt the same, Gerard and Dan were up in front setting the pace with the others in tow, about 1/2 lap into the race I moved up to Dans wheel just behind Gerard and settled in to see how long I could hang. It was going well, heartrate was not skying and it seemed easy enuff to stay in contact but of course it was still the first lap, and then it happened, I felt the rim hit something hard and then moments later I could feel it on the ground, done, race over, flatted a 100.00 tire. I made my way back to the pits and put my spare wheel on and waited for the leaders to come around just so I could ride and see if I could keep pace. I jumped back in just as Dan, in 2nd, went by and followed him for a while then passed and rode up to Gerard and followed him for a lap. Didn't seem too hard but again I was much fresher since I was on the sidelines for a while. Here's the video I took.http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2496556249650700986

Race # 2 Fort Yargo, Winder Ga Oct 28th 07 Having flatted at the previous weeks race I was pumped for this race, I arrived the day before and went to the course and spent 1 hour riding the course, learning the lines and practicing the barriers and the sand. I was able to ride about half way thru the beach but then my dismount was not too pretty but I decided to ride as much as I could during the race, I just hated to waste all that speed going onto the beach. Race morning and I was feeling really anxious, I didn't sleep that well the night before, I just kept going over the course in my head and playing out how I thought the race would go.

The masters lined up and this weeks field was about 10 short of the previous week and no Gerard, but Dan, Torre, Lamar, David, Brad, Jim, Wojtec and other strong riders were there to take up the slack. Brad was kind enough to give me a spot on the front row for the start and off we flew. For the first 1/2 mile we were on a fast paved road section and the big guns all grabbed their place near the front, I choose not to get caught up in the holeshot action and was about 8 back from the front but moved up several places as we went off road the first time. Brad, Lamar and David were setting the pace up front and I noticed that Dan was a few places behind me, which suprised me a little. At 3/4 of the way thru the 1st lap I had moved to 3rd behind Lamar and Brad and went past in the single track section somewhere around the headless GTC rider. At this point Dan was behind me, I didn't know it at the time, and I kept going my same pace which kept putting time between me and the field. Looking at my video afterwards I see that at some points during the race I had pulled out a lead where that no one can be seen chasing on the road after you make the left turn at the top of the hill. I never let up the pace though and kept riding onto the sandy beach and actually fell twice in the sand which let Dan catch sight of me and he pulled me in on the last lap. Now I didn't fall on the last lap but Dan was really charging and he caught and passed me just past the finish line of the last lap, I figured I could save a little energy right then and re-pass him in the fast woods section, so I got on Dan's wheel and we went off the pavement into the woods pretty damn fast, the 3rd left hand sweeper I made my move and passed Dan taking his line and causing him to overrreact and hitting the course marking tape wrapping it in his wheel, this gave me about a 30 second advantage which I held till the end and my first ever cross win.