enough!

Shari and I had planned on riding the sunrise lap together. My girls were really cool about helping coordinate so I could get on the trail in time.

Shari was in no position to ride the sunrise lap, but since the girls worked so hard to arrange the schedule, I felt compelled to do it anyway. I was going to leave at 5:00am in hopes to catch the sunrise at the top of the mountain.

It was really tough to put those bike clothes on. I’d been off the bike for almost 7 hours, and had roughly an hour of sleep (dozing on the couch). I was tired, sore, and had already done my minimum required laps. It was easy to think about skipping the sunrise and trying to catch another lap later. With help from others (thanks Nick and MIke!), I convinced myself to do it.

My HID died, 2.5 miles in. This wasn’t as traumatic as I thought it would be. I still had helmet issues, even after I moved my HID mount further back on the helmet. When the HID died, I took the light off my head and put it in my pocket. The yelllow light from the Trail Ratt was actually nicer than the white light of the HID. Also, daylight was starting, so it was getting easier to see.

I took bad line after bad line. I fell, sometime either just before of just after my HID died and was really frustrated. I felt like I walked more than previous laps and the course seemed to be more difficult.

I kept going. I had to. My ‘goal’ was to do 4 laps, my ‘fallback goal’ was 3. I needed to finish this lap.

By the time I was on the cart path, it was raining pretty hard. I was tired like I’ve never been tired before – exhausted tired. Skat passed me on the cart climb and offered a bit of SpokeDrunkie cheer. Luckily, the rain hadn’t yet made its way through the trees, so the big downhill wasn’t getting muddy (yet!). But, I was so tired, and so ‘strung out’, that I was picking really bad lines. I was nervous and sketchy. I was ON THE BRAKES, but I had to go fast enough not to endo. At one point, the trail was so soft that i just kind of fell out from underneath me. I saw myself flying headfirst into a tree. Somehow, I jumped off the bike and landed on my feet, right next to it. Heh. Skill I didn’t even know I had 😉

Anyway, I was glad to be done. I was done. Done. DOne!

As it turns out, I was the last Hella Bella out on the course. Brent called the race at 10am because of the rain.

Hindsight? I’m really glad I did that lap. Fuck. It was hard.

…… might have another post in me tonight or tomorrow …..