A good week

I rode a total of five different bikes this past week and was able to ride my mountain bike three days with different trails each time. It was a good week.

My old hardtail Juliana is hooked up to Christopher's little Trek and Christopher now asks for his helmet on and to get "Mommy's green bike and my blue bike." My kid is three and already bugging me to ride. Awesome. = )

I also went to the bandit Church Cross on Sunday morning. It was a great layout and it felt awesome to be on my cross bike and hopping over barriers. I was even happy to look down and see my heartrate so fricken high. Yes, I'm insane. I opted to ride out there, which wasn't bad, but riding back home in the heat after the all-out effort was brutal. I definitely should've brought an extra Gu with me.

I should have worked this morning while Christopher was at summer camp but snuck in an hour ride on some singletrack before the forecasted rain. It hasn't rained yet which is even better since I'd like to log some more time at Palos before the race.

I'm planning on doing Downers Grove so I'll probably do the Matteson training crit tomorrow. Downers is a huge race and I'm interested to see how I'll do but it's hard for me to get excited about a road race. Now, Palos -- that I'm totally psyched for. I've been feeling good and have my fingers crossed that I can actually stay healthy for a couple of weeks.

Almost

(photo from Rusty)

First off, sorry to those I spoke to right after the race as I always tend to be cranky-- focusing on what I did wrong. In this case, I started the race freaking out about the guys having to pass me in the singletrack, particularly the first rock garden on Alpha. I kept thinking I would crash if I had a bunch of guys behind me there. So, of course, I did. I rode it super smooth my second lap. But, both the first and third lap I stopped and then tipped over to the left. Totally dumb.

The rest of the race actually went pretty good for me. I rode most of the singletrack really well. Even parts that I usually have problems with (although I did clip a tree my first lap). I would occasionally freak out and tell myself to calm down and ride smooth. I noticed Liz coming over the bridge over all the rocks as I was heading to O'Malleys Woods near the end of our second lap and looked at my heart rate monitor. When I got to her spot I realized I was only four minutes behind her. I tried to kick it up a notch telling myself to just ride smooth. Then, I tip over in the same stupid rock garden my third lap. Great, there goes that I thought. But, as I was climbing the top of the hill I saw her standing on the down hill, letting people go by (which was because she had unfortunately crashed as I later found out). I tried to kick it up again although that last part of the climb to the top is a killer. When I got to the bottom, I realized I was probably less than three minutes behind her now. I went all out and ended up about a minute and a half behind. (I thought I was less but apparently WORS timing doesn't delete the minute delay from the men's start to our start.) My best WORS finish in a long time -- not including the short track at last year's Suburu Cup. So, not bad considering it's only my third mountainbike cross country race of the year when it's probably double that for many and I'm still hacking up crap on climbs from that chest cold I had. I'm excited about the Palos Meltdown. I got out there twice last week and am hoping to get out again this week. We'll probably do Lake Geneva and then switch to cross. I've bought numerous stuff for my cross bike with my QBP discount -- Tom and I (mostly Tom) will have to get crankin' on getting it ready. I love mountainbiking but, boy, do I love cross too. = )