Well I'm getting my report up earlier than expected. It turned into a much longer day today than originally expected. The prerace routine was nothing out of the ordinary. Brandon was running late so I was smart and left some dry clothes at the finish line. At the start line you could tell it was going to be a tough race with some top level racers there. The weather was, well, umm Cold, rainy and windy. It was going to be a tough race.

The start was tough, It was right to the top of Beaver Valley Ski Club. Great way to start. With everything so slick climbing was tough and it was a hike for half the climb. From there they got into a the first section of single track followed by a nice long downhill. Now I consider myself a pretty good descender and I went into this a little to confident. I passed a half dozen riders in the first section of the hill then caught a few more. People were going down but I just stayed off the brakes as much as possible. Then bam I was down. It was a smooth slide and popped right back up. Bam again I was down. The third time I came down on the derailleur side and I started having major shifting problem and chain jump.

From there it was gong back up. It continued to rain and the trail was pretty much a skating rink. We made it into the Kolapore singletrack and it was surprisingly good and ride able. I was still having a hard time getting my rhythm but things finally started to click about an hour into the ride. Before that point I was probably in the top 40. After the I finally got settled in I started to reel in riders. Before leaving the kolapore single track I passed 10 riders. Of course I was happy with the progress and was pushing a pretty good pace. Awww then there was the bridge crossing. Or more the bridge sliding. With all the mud the wood was like ice and I thought I was going swimming.

Hit the first feed zone and topped up one of my bottles. Went to pour in my ziplock bag of Cytomax and to my great surprise it wasn't in my jersey. One of the organizers there said he saw it right after the start line. I was riding with two bottle one of Eload and one of Cytomax. Well this was going to make things tough. Left with the water and took two gels in. Hit a great section for me with a good road section. Hit the big ring got down on the bars and hammered. Caught up with the owner/manager of Arrow Racing on this section and he grabbed a wheel. I hoped we could work together to catch the next rider in the distance. I should have pushed a bit harder and dropped him allot earlier but he kept paced till the last big climb on the road. This would come back to bit me later on as he caught me in 3 stage and eventually beat me by about 2 minutes. I could have put that on him in the road section.

Let the fun begin. 3 stage is an awesome place to ride. One of my favorites when its dry. Its all clay and with all the rain this last week I want you to use your imagination of the worst mud you have ever ridden and times that by 10. The first double track section wasn't to bad but when we got into the single track it started to really get slick. Riding the berms and banking corners were completely out of the question. Some of the off camber stuff was basically holding on for dear life with one foot unclipped to try and catch myself before I would go down. Oh this is the great section of the course. From here it got tough. That's an understatement. Climbing was almost impossible. There wasn't a tire out there that would have got you up most of the climbs. This also when the clay turned closer to cement and started to jam up every moving part. This includes wheels. There were times that you would just drag the bike. Now this also made even walking a complete nightmare.

These are mountain bike trails not good hiking trails. It was so slick that trying to get up some of these rises took every ounce of strenght and balance. I slipped many a times. I know 3 Stage really well I trust me when I say that I was happy to see the final segments of single track heading to Line 2. Considering how slow I was riding I still managed to pass half a dozen riders plus in this section.

Now I was starting to feel like crap out there. Because of the conditions it was very very difficult to drink while in motion and the walking sections you needed both hands to keep the bike moving. I was also running a bit low on energy so as I hit the 2nd feed zone I had one of the guys throw me a banana. I didn't slow down as the 10 or so riders that were stopped moved me up in the standings. Everyone was hurting by this point. I would ha ve stopped to but I had the guy from Arrow Racing in my sights. Eating a banana as 40 km/h with no hands going down hill is very interesting. Oh and this was on gravel. I smoked it down Line 2 and into the next run of double track.

I really figured that most of the climbing was done. Ya well I was wrong. This section was cruel with most of it almost unrideable. Oh and then came the bridges. I swear I should have been in the river a couple times and my knees are feeling the twisting slides. There was only around 3 km to go but it was really tough. It was still hike a bike up most of the step climbs. I hi the timing tent at 4:14.

Bill Trayling from Running Free had was up on the road and screamed down to me. "Well What do you think?" My response. The section through 3 stage was stupid. I shouldn't have been in there today. Its not that I didn't like the course. My initial time calculation for a dry course would have been about 3 hours. Over an hour longer than planned. There were still a ton of riders still out there and I would not be surprised that some of the slowest would be pushing the 6 hour mark.

So why do I think 3 stage shouldn't have been in there. A few reasons. One everyone there knows that its slicker than ice when it rains there. With that it made it dangerous. I love technical but there were some sections in there that someone could have been hurt really bad. There is know real access for first aid either. I did see a few riders come in with some minor wounds. Second the damage down to the trail was not worth it. Because of the skidding and hiking the trail will have some major damage done. Th e Kolapore section was much safer and they could have ran two loops through there instead. I think if the weather had be agreeable it would have been an amazing course. The other issue was the time frame changes. with 2 feed zones and the times being dramatically longer there were gong to be alot of riders bonking out there. I was running pretty low and I was prepped to handle up to 4 hours. Some wouldn't be. I passe some 30 km racers and you could tell they were not having fun. Actually most that I passed were not. For me I don't mind the pain but this was defiantly a new pain. The Uxbrige Icebreaker wasn't this muddy and everyone saw the picture of me at the finish line.

So overall I was happy with my performance. As for the event I will say that it was amazingly well marked and every road crossing had cops there letting us go riping through. Lots of volunteers which was awesome. The course plan was awesome and in any other weather conditions would have been very fast and flowy. My complaints were the damage to 3 stage and the safety issues. Also. The other big one. The idea of parking cars at on venue and then having to wait for a bus to return to the vehicle was stupid. As was the fact that we were limited to where you could go to warm up, get cleaned up and eat etc. There will be alot of sick racers tomorrow because of that.

Also the fact the the buses were not on schedule really started to piss me off. The 5 o'clock bus didn't show till closer to 5:30 and so on for the following buses. Because of that I missed my concert. Sorry Scott. It would have been tough sitting n a tight concert hall though after this event. I know that there were some complaints from other racers on the bus schedule and the fact that we had to leave our bikes in a secure location instead of bringing them back to the cars on the bus. I'm hoping the organizer are aware of the bad things that happened because I can see this become an awesome event with some planning revisions.

So as for me. I haven't really ridden much since Hot August Nights. The climbing legs were not all there but this really wasn't a good test. The final results were not up but I'm figuring that I finished in the high side of the top 20. My bike, I'll deal with that tomorrow but it's going to need some drivetrain repairs. My body overall isn't to bad but I've got some new war wounds from all the falls. Oh and a good stat number. I fell more today than I have all season. Tomorrow will be a recovery ride at the Terry Fox Run. On the road so zero mud to deal with. I hope!!!