May 14, 2007

UCI Maplelag Race Report

I should be in bed right now, it's been a busy week and I'm pretty wasted from the traveling, racing, more traveling, and finally all the unpacking.

This week I drove back from Boulder, CO to Minnesota to do the UCI race at Maplelag. It was great to do a race at a new location that I've never raced before and I was very surprised at how hard the course was. Tight singletrack with lots of roots and rocks along with very steep decents and technical steep climbs back up the hills. It was definitely one of the hardest courses I've done in the midwest and also the most fun.
Trek at the front

Doug took the hole shot as normal and midway through the lap I took over and drilled it pretty hard. I was feeling pretty good compared to the last two weekends and it seemed like gaps were opening so I gave it pretty hard. Jeff ended up getting away from me in some of the singletrack later in lap and I never saw him again. Tonkin caught me soon after, but then flatted right away which was a bummer cause he was going strong and might have been able to ride back up to Hall.
Unfortunately there wasn't that great of a turnout for it being a UCI C2 event which was sort of a bummer just in the fact that Jay put in a lot of hard work to get this race and then not that many riders showed. I guess there's a few different reasons why some of the guys didn't want to come, hopefully others see and hear how a great a race it was and decide to do it next year if there is one. I would definitely do it again, and I think everyone else would too. Great trails, tough competition, great money, fun cabins and camp dining make it a great weekend of racing.

2 comments:

Echelon said...

awesome.

Jay Richards said...

Thanks for supporting our event. I was watching you guys on the first lap before the lakeside drops and your pass on the singletrack before the first drop was wicked. Great bike handling.