the last couple weeks....

The last couple of weeks have been filled with all kinds of riding and racing.  Two weeks ago was the Michaux Mash. Last weekend was a Saturday ride out of cadence with the visit pa team, and a Sunday Rockburn Reloaded race.  The team kits also came in and they look sweet!!  

Two weeks ago was the Michaux Mash, which is one of our team races. Jacob and I arrived up at Zach's house on Friday night and we started gathering things for the race.  We were up so late i didn't think i was going to be physically able to make the 8:00 ride start the following morning.  Saturdays ride was phenomenal, on one of the downhills i was flying and came to this built up bridge out of branches.I did a huge endo, and came very close to flipping over.  I herd Jenny laughing in the background.    The trails up there are so technical and fun when we finished my legs didn't even feel like i rode for as long as we did.  We passed Camp Thompson, where this upcoming weekends MACDC camp will be held.  After we got back from the ride, Jacob, Jenny, and I were on bacon duty.  We grilled 3 full packages of bacon, it took forever!!  After that some of us Marked the course and the others prepared Sundays delicious meal.  That night Tom instituted a bed time of 9:00 sharp. I awoke the next morning to the smell of Toms great waffles.  I had some waffles then Zach and I went and marked the road signs.  Once at the venue, Jeff and I were controlling the parking.  We wore cool orange vests and had walkie talkies.  With like 20 minutes till race time we were relieved of our duties, and told to suit up.  I rode around for a few minutes knowing a warm up wouldn't help to much in a four hour race.  I really don't enjoy riding my bike for long periods of time but i thought this race was really fun.  I would much rather do a nice short 2.5 hour XC race.  I wasn't sure how well id feel after a long ride on Saturday and limited amounts of sleep on Friday, but i felt quite well.  The race started and me and Madison and Jacob, the only three juniors, started off at a brisk pace.  No one wanting to push to hard in the beginning we set into a good pace and we flying down the first single track and i guess we missed a sharp left hand turn.  We went down a grassy double track and hit a dead end.  Acura Matt, Craig Lander, Madison, a whole bunch of other people, and I then turned around and climbed back out.  So now we were passing people we already passed and it was a little frustrating, all of my anger was gone when i hit that final descent into the killer hill.  I started pushing on the hill and wasn't sure if it was a good idea.  I felt good on the first lap and second.  The third lap was the hardest for me even tho my fourth was the slowest.  I had a fun time and kinda liked the endurance race.  I came in first with a time of 4:19, Madison 2nd, and jacob 3rd.  Jacob DNF'd with blown out lefty  andhopefully he can get it fixed soon.   

Next Saturday was a ride with Visit Pa out of Cadence, in Manayunk.  I was a little late arriving because of some traffic, but i just made it.  Aaron was there along with Visit Pa. and we did a sweet ride at Wisahickon.  After the ride everyone stuck around and watched how cadence does bike fittings and different tests and it was really neat.  It showed how just one mm can make the biggest differences.  The next day was the Rockburn Reloaded race put on my C3 Sollay.  I will be racing cross for that team next year and am really excited!!  This would be my fist Jr. Expert race which i will be racing for NORBA races this year.  I met this really good kid named Joe Drobrowski, he was super fast and really nice.  Since it was just me and Joe in Jr. expert class, he asked if we could start with the Pro/Cat 1 guys.  I was lined up with Chris Etough, Jeff, Zach, Jeff Schalk.  It was pretty scary and i was really intimidated.  in the beginning you went up this hill and made a left on a gradual road.  I saw the guy in front of me take the corner inside in between a sign and a bush and i avoided the hole jam up.  I got all the jitters out right there.  I flew up the hill and was having a great time.  The course was like a giant short track course with like 2 logs and no rocks.  You were peddling the entire time with no chances for breaks.  Somewhere on the 2 lap Kris Auer slowed down a little and let me catch up. We were riding with these two guys and Kris gave me some tips and we just were able to drop them without evening trying.  My middle two laps felt like i used the least energy but they were my fastest.  I thought i did pretty well getting 2nd in my class, and about 17th outa 25 in the open class.  Jeff, Jake, Jenny, and Zach all had really good races to! Jenny beat up on a bunch of boys, apparently two of then came across the line thinking they were one and two but then somebody pointed to jenny and had to let them know she was the winner.

Then on Monday i took a friend mountain biking  who had never done it before to one of my favorite secret places .  He seemed to have a really good time, and i think he is hooked. We took a couple short videos that are down below.  I cant wait for next week and the MACDC camp.