It was a perfect day for Mountain Bike racing this past Sunday at the CCCX XC race #3. The race route was really good, and the hill climb portions I added to the design of the course really took their toll on the racers. The added climbing made for some great action and tested every ones strength and endurance.
Personally, I attacked early in my race just to see who was willing to throw it down early. One rider, Alex Rousch, followed me and the two of us gapped the others. Alex kept the pressure on and I lost contact with him after one lap. He was the race winner on the day. I then was riding solo with a strong group of four riders working together to chase me. A few times the gap was only 10 seconds, however I worked as hard as possible to keep a gap on the chasers and try to frustrate their effort to get on terms with me. This worked and after three laps I had dropped the chasers by over a minute and then worked hard to get to the finish. In the end I was 2nd place.
I tried to hit every hill as hard as I could, and overall it was a extremely hard race. I do feel digging deep and hitting out as hard as possible up the hills will help me in future events.
