I busted on down to Durango in the fine company of my daughter Rebecca. She’s an excellent traveling partner when her brother, Lucas, is not part of the equation. It’s not that she’s not a good traveler when Lucas is around, but it is a bit hard to leave him alone sometimes… We left Laramie on Friday, Becca missing only the second day of school all year (and the other was for a doctor’s appointment), and made it to Durango and my mom’s place in the early afternoon. Becca reacquainted herself with Nana’s garden, and we discussed race strategy. Becca was to race the kid's race on Saturday, and I the Vet Sport Men’s 40-44 race on Sunday. We went in to have dinner with my sister and Dusty. It was pretty entertaining, and a friend of theirs with a French exchange student in tow showed up to stay with them and do the road race the next day. The student was a stud espoir racer and the friend a stud Master’s racer. They had about $8,000 of bikes and gear on and in their car. I salivated. They each ended up having a miserable race, but they sure looked fast.

Becca made a game go of it in her race. They have the kid's race at the base of Chapman hill and it’s a miserable place for a kid's race. It’s dusty and rutted and bumpy and small and a bit too hilly for a kid's race. They should just bite the bullet and take it somewhere else – it really is not as much fun or instructive as it should be. Becca lined up with the 8 year-olds. She started slow, just like her father usually does, and was making her way up through the field when a girl hit one of those ruts, bounced sideways and took Becca out. She went in to the dirt face first, broke her visor such that it was wedged down in front of her eyes. I went to her rescue as she picked herself up and the first thing she said was "I’m going to finish". I pulled the visor out of her eyes and she mounted up and finished (still in third or fourth out of about 8 girls). Remarkably, she was largely unscathed, taking only a nasty bruise to her ribs where she hit the bars. A witness said she went in face first – thankfully there was a lot of dust to cushion the impact. I was proud and impressed.

Sunday dawned hot, and it got hotter. That was my downfall. I was on pace to a good ride, perhaps my best in this type of race – lots of people on a "technical" course. I started well, largely do to a good position on the start (front row on the inside). The start was uphill and immediately got steeper and then went single track. Last year, I was squeezed out at the single track and never recovered. This year I hit the single track in third position, and within a half mile I moved up to second position. The guy in the front roared off the line and I never saw him again after the first minute. Someone passed me on the first climb and I hit the top in third, with the guy in second only a few seconds ahead. Two guys were pushing my tail, but I was within my limits so I was happy. We wound through some flat single track and hit the short stretch of road and flew down it to Horse Gulch. I think this was the last time I drank water until it was too late, an hour later. As we flew toward the single track in Horse Gulch, I settled into fourth, happy to be there and keeping third place in sight. We started to pass various riders from the group in front of us, and as it was all twisty-turny singletrack it sometimes proved problematic. At some point I had a few people stacked up behind me on a downhill portion of the track. I realized I was being wimpy and should just go, and go I did. One guy sat on me pretty hard, with me gapping him a bit on the uphills. At some point he said "Awesome pull man, you’re doing great". It made my day/race/week. I was going good (for me) and felt strong. I started to sip some water and found that I was very thirsty – not a good sign. We started the climb up Raider Ridge and I was still feeling good. I figured I could do some damage here, and then just like that I was reeling. It was so hot and I was so thirst and for the first time in memory I actually stopped in a race. I don’t think I could have kept myself upright if I hadn’t stopped. I don’t imagine I was stopped much more than a minute and I pushed the bike up the hill to the top. I remounted, but bumped hesitantly along across the top of the ridge, down into Horse Gulch, and then limped up the powerline. There’s a fast, steep, twisty, brush enveloped single track that takes you back over to the college that had terrified me in the past. I was doing okay and then washed out the front wheel and went right over the bars into the scrub oak. I dragged myself out the bush, leaving one leaning across the trail, and limped down to the road. That was pretty much all she wrote – I was toast. I finished the race and all, but surrendered a number of positions during that whole fiasco. I ended up 9^th after it was all said and done, winning a box of Cliff Bars. Moral of the story – hydrate, hydrate, hydrate. The course was too technical for me to not use a camel back, and I should have had more water to boot! Next time…

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