Oh where to start.LOL
2 weeks ago we decide we are going to pre register for the Cyleland enduro. Me, Uwe, Faisal,& Rick. I get our registration sent in. Faisal decides to go riding and busts some bones in his leg so he is out now.
Earlier this week Mel, and myself decide tuesday night that we would go to Hooter's for dinner. We got home and she was feeling ill. About 12:00am I wake up and I am now feeling ill. Yeap that's right we got food poisoning. We both had to take a few days off to recover. You can bet that I will not be eating at Hooter's anymore!!!!!!!
Friday before the race Uwe calls me and says he is out because the weather forecast is calling for rain and alot of it at Cycleland. I get mad at the forecast because I have spent the last 3 weeks doing a top end on my Gaser and had several problems along the way with doing it, but I got the bike back together and running like a bat out of **** and I am anxious to race it and see how it performs.
I call Rick friday evening and we both decide that we would make a call on saturday morning to decide if we were going to the race or not. I made a few calls to people that I know that have raced Cycleland when it was wet and got pretty much the same response from all of them. They say the ground holds water really well Except in a few areas.
Saturday morning comes and I get a phone call from Uwe early in the morning. I am kinda shocked because Uwe for the most part is a late sleeper. LOL He asked if I was still thinking about going. I told him that I was not sure. He said he would go if I was going. Boy talk about having pressure on myself. I did not want to go if it was going to be raining but on the other hand I did not want to miss another race if it was not going to be that bad either. We both had made a bad choice with the Sidewinders Enduro and it turned out to be an awesome race from what our friends had told us.
Anyways I am constantly looking at several weather forecasts online and I am a freaking nervous wreck and can not decide what to do. A report comes from one of the course workers that Cycleland had got about 1.5 inches of rain early that morning, but the skys were clearing.
I tried calling Rick 4 or 5 times and he never answered. Argghhhhhh!LOL Matt another frined of mine calls and said he is going. This guy is in 1st or 2nd place in the Masters class so he will race no matter what the weather is doing.
More calls to Uwe and Rick and I call Uwe back one last time, "Screw it dude let's go racing" I telll him. In the back of my mind I am hoping like **** it does not rain because Uwe will never let it go.LOL
I call Rick and tell him we are going and for him to get his stuff ready and that he can meet Uwe over at Uwe's house and then they can come by and pick me up. Okay mate hey says, I just have to change my rear tire out. Cool man no problem Uwe has to do about an hour's worth of work to his Gaser before we can leave.
About an hour goes buy and Rick calls me. Seems that he has bout the wrong size tire and has to go and buy another one before we can leave. Cool man we have time no worries I tell him.
Well Uwe comes to pick me up and I call Rick. He is not going to be able to make it because no bike shops in his area have the right size tire for his bike. This sucks because I was really looking forward to kicking his butt at the race.LOL
We arrive in Nacogdoches and we go and get our registration finished up, put our numbers and our time cards on our bikes. Matt has gotten us a motel room so we meet up with him later on.
Race day comes early. Uwe, and myself grab our showers and get geared up. Uwe opens the door at the motle and no rain has hit! Thank God! My decision seems to have been a good one.LOL
We get to Cycleland and have the riders meeting. We go over our bikes once more and finish gearing up. We will leave the start line at 8:17AM.
We make our way over to the starting line and watch as the rows in front of us take off.
5,4,3,2,1, go this is a dead engine start so we have to kick our bikes to life. We have an A class rider on our row so he takes off first. Uwe seems to have a problem with his bike starting so I take off 2nd knowing that Uwe is going to catch up soon enough.
So far it is an easy pace and the I am getting great traction and am feeling pretty good. I settle in to my normal pace. I hear a bike coming up behind me and it is Uwe. I let him go by and just follow him. We zero the first check. We get into more technical stuff and I am feeling very tired already. I notice I am sweating badly and that I am riding around with my bite valve in my mouth constantly drinking water.
I think I drop one minute at the next check and it all goes down hill from there. Cycleland has everything from tight woods riding to sand, mud, and some rocks. It is an awesome place to ride. If you don't like big deep whoops then this is not the place for you. They will wear you out quickly.
I battle mud slicken roots, bark bustin trees, deep sand, nasty off camber turns,,etc. I go into the 3rd check and I am very upset with myself. I am falling way behind and am just feeling exhausted.
When I arrive at the gas stop Uwe has already been there and gone so I just gas up my bike grab a quick drink of water from my water jug and go back to racing. I can't loose anymore time and I need to gain some of my minutes back. I was making bad decisions and dumping my bike alot. More times then I can count really. This was not making any sense to me. I am for the most part a decent rider and I don't normally struggle like this.
I am now being passed by row 30. This means that I am 13 minutes behind my row. I am to far back now to make up anytime so all I can do is stay on top of the minute which I am riding now.
I start seeing the mileage markers 42,45,48, etc and I know that the finsh is coming soon. Aww finally I come to the finish. I turn in my card and am just really upset at myself. I get over to Uwe's truck and he is nowhere to be found. I grab a red bull and down it. I took off my gear and just layed there on the tailgate of his truck resting. I get on my bike and go see how Amber did. She broke her chain and was unable to finish the race.
Uwe comes in and he liked the course so much that he ran it twice!LOL They had screwed up some of the markings at the split for long and short course. He turned in a good time card and was holding 3rd in the Sportsman class. Even with my rough day I was holding 4th place.
We loaded up the bikes and had to wait for the other riders to turn in their time cards before the Trophies were to be handed out.
Uwe got 3rd in the Sportsman class and I got bumped to 5th in the Open C class. We both got what I would consider a cool trophy. It was a picture frame with a plate on it with your place and class. You had to buy your own photo though.LOL Which we did.
The only thing that I can think of is that with having food poisoning this week is that my body was not quite healed up yet. I am not making excuses but I normally ride alot better and smarter than I did.
Thanks for the good times Uwe! It is always fun when you are around!LOL
Next stop is the Red River Enduro in 2 weeks. Our stomping grounds!!!!!!!
2 weeks ago we decide we are going to pre register for the Cyleland enduro. Me, Uwe, Faisal,& Rick. I get our registration sent in. Faisal decides to go riding and busts some bones in his leg so he is out now.
Earlier this week Mel, and myself decide tuesday night that we would go to Hooter's for dinner. We got home and she was feeling ill. About 12:00am I wake up and I am now feeling ill. Yeap that's right we got food poisoning. We both had to take a few days off to recover. You can bet that I will not be eating at Hooter's anymore!!!!!!!
Friday before the race Uwe calls me and says he is out because the weather forecast is calling for rain and alot of it at Cycleland. I get mad at the forecast because I have spent the last 3 weeks doing a top end on my Gaser and had several problems along the way with doing it, but I got the bike back together and running like a bat out of **** and I am anxious to race it and see how it performs.
I call Rick friday evening and we both decide that we would make a call on saturday morning to decide if we were going to the race or not. I made a few calls to people that I know that have raced Cycleland when it was wet and got pretty much the same response from all of them. They say the ground holds water really well Except in a few areas.
Saturday morning comes and I get a phone call from Uwe early in the morning. I am kinda shocked because Uwe for the most part is a late sleeper. LOL He asked if I was still thinking about going. I told him that I was not sure. He said he would go if I was going. Boy talk about having pressure on myself. I did not want to go if it was going to be raining but on the other hand I did not want to miss another race if it was not going to be that bad either. We both had made a bad choice with the Sidewinders Enduro and it turned out to be an awesome race from what our friends had told us.
Anyways I am constantly looking at several weather forecasts online and I am a freaking nervous wreck and can not decide what to do. A report comes from one of the course workers that Cycleland had got about 1.5 inches of rain early that morning, but the skys were clearing.
I tried calling Rick 4 or 5 times and he never answered. Argghhhhhh!LOL Matt another frined of mine calls and said he is going. This guy is in 1st or 2nd place in the Masters class so he will race no matter what the weather is doing.
More calls to Uwe and Rick and I call Uwe back one last time, "Screw it dude let's go racing" I telll him. In the back of my mind I am hoping like **** it does not rain because Uwe will never let it go.LOL
I call Rick and tell him we are going and for him to get his stuff ready and that he can meet Uwe over at Uwe's house and then they can come by and pick me up. Okay mate hey says, I just have to change my rear tire out. Cool man no problem Uwe has to do about an hour's worth of work to his Gaser before we can leave.
About an hour goes buy and Rick calls me. Seems that he has bout the wrong size tire and has to go and buy another one before we can leave. Cool man we have time no worries I tell him.
Well Uwe comes to pick me up and I call Rick. He is not going to be able to make it because no bike shops in his area have the right size tire for his bike. This sucks because I was really looking forward to kicking his butt at the race.LOL
We arrive in Nacogdoches and we go and get our registration finished up, put our numbers and our time cards on our bikes. Matt has gotten us a motel room so we meet up with him later on.
Race day comes early. Uwe, and myself grab our showers and get geared up. Uwe opens the door at the motle and no rain has hit! Thank God! My decision seems to have been a good one.LOL
We get to Cycleland and have the riders meeting. We go over our bikes once more and finish gearing up. We will leave the start line at 8:17AM.
We make our way over to the starting line and watch as the rows in front of us take off.
5,4,3,2,1, go this is a dead engine start so we have to kick our bikes to life. We have an A class rider on our row so he takes off first. Uwe seems to have a problem with his bike starting so I take off 2nd knowing that Uwe is going to catch up soon enough.
So far it is an easy pace and the I am getting great traction and am feeling pretty good. I settle in to my normal pace. I hear a bike coming up behind me and it is Uwe. I let him go by and just follow him. We zero the first check. We get into more technical stuff and I am feeling very tired already. I notice I am sweating badly and that I am riding around with my bite valve in my mouth constantly drinking water.
I think I drop one minute at the next check and it all goes down hill from there. Cycleland has everything from tight woods riding to sand, mud, and some rocks. It is an awesome place to ride. If you don't like big deep whoops then this is not the place for you. They will wear you out quickly.
I battle mud slicken roots, bark bustin trees, deep sand, nasty off camber turns,,etc. I go into the 3rd check and I am very upset with myself. I am falling way behind and am just feeling exhausted.
When I arrive at the gas stop Uwe has already been there and gone so I just gas up my bike grab a quick drink of water from my water jug and go back to racing. I can't loose anymore time and I need to gain some of my minutes back. I was making bad decisions and dumping my bike alot. More times then I can count really. This was not making any sense to me. I am for the most part a decent rider and I don't normally struggle like this.
I am now being passed by row 30. This means that I am 13 minutes behind my row. I am to far back now to make up anytime so all I can do is stay on top of the minute which I am riding now.
I start seeing the mileage markers 42,45,48, etc and I know that the finsh is coming soon. Aww finally I come to the finish. I turn in my card and am just really upset at myself. I get over to Uwe's truck and he is nowhere to be found. I grab a red bull and down it. I took off my gear and just layed there on the tailgate of his truck resting. I get on my bike and go see how Amber did. She broke her chain and was unable to finish the race.
Uwe comes in and he liked the course so much that he ran it twice!LOL They had screwed up some of the markings at the split for long and short course. He turned in a good time card and was holding 3rd in the Sportsman class. Even with my rough day I was holding 4th place.
We loaded up the bikes and had to wait for the other riders to turn in their time cards before the Trophies were to be handed out.
Uwe got 3rd in the Sportsman class and I got bumped to 5th in the Open C class. We both got what I would consider a cool trophy. It was a picture frame with a plate on it with your place and class. You had to buy your own photo though.LOL Which we did.
The only thing that I can think of is that with having food poisoning this week is that my body was not quite healed up yet. I am not making excuses but I normally ride alot better and smarter than I did.
Thanks for the good times Uwe! It is always fun when you are around!LOL
Next stop is the Red River Enduro in 2 weeks. Our stomping grounds!!!!!!!