28 June 2009  |  Race Reports

BC Bike Race Day 1

Day 1 of BC Bike Race is in the books. It was pretty cool racing with a teammate (especially a really fast one…). I started things off right by not warming up enough and feeling like a pile of poop for the first 20 minutes. My legs loaded up immediately. After the race Ryan even noted “you blew up after, like 2 minutes!” The first couple of kilometers were rolling pavement and then we dove into singletrack, so the pace was pretty tough from the start. Once I warmed up though, I started feeling pretty good and we were able to make up a few spots on the first climb.

The first downhill (a trail called Severed Dick that all the locals just call “Severed.” I would always call it Severed Dick if I was a local) went pretty smoothly. I led since Ryan hadn’t gotten a chance to pre-ride, and then when it flattened out Ryan got in front and pulled us along to the next climb. It was like what I imagine motor-pacing is like.

The next downhill had some more steep technical stuff- a lot like what you find in a World Cup race, only a lot longer and more! Luckily I only had one crash, and it was an awesome slow motion over-the-bars crash. We did a good mix of running and riding (it was at this point that Katerina and Catharine caught up to us and then dropped us). It was so much fun though, and the trails were in great shape. We ended up finishing as the first mixed team in less than 2 hours. It was like a cross-country, except Ryan was there to sing to me the whole time (I also got to hear some nice spoken-word poetry…). Tomorrow’s stage will be longer, and I am looking forward to a slower start (hopefully). The trails in BC have been pretty spectacular so far, so I am excited for what’s to come.