Copa Chile Jeep #4

The 4th stop of the Copa Chile mountain bike series happened a long time ago.  Unfortunately, it happened during the time I wasn’t really blogging.  Then I raced the 5th (and final) stop of the series.  Then we moved.  Because of all of this exciteme

nt, I am just now getting around to writing about both races which means I may not remember them nearly as well as I did earlier (which means shorter posts).

Here were my thoughts during the 4th stop of the Copa Chile (Concepcion)

On the start line:

“Okay, just focus on the race.  Ignore the stomach, it’s probably just nerves anyway.  Okay, so it’s not just nerves...the bathroom says it’s not just nerves.  Focus, focus, breathe, calm...  Wish that breakfast had been bigger than yesterday’s.  How are a bunch of bike racers supposed to survive on bread and tea?  Good thing Antonio bought

 that oatmeal and fruit.  Wish I’d gotten a better warm-up and wish I had mud tires. No point thinking about that now. FOCUS!”

GO!

“WEEE!  Here we go!  Come on guys, FASTER!  Wow, look out for the crash.  Bummer for those guys.  Stay with the fast group.  Pedal, pedal, pedal, just keep pedaling.”

*Pant, pant*

“Oh man, these guys are fast!”

Part way through the race:

“Oh, not good. I’m bonking. I should’ve started a bit slower, or at least pulled back earlier. Dangit. Okay, just keep pedaling. If I can keep going at a somewhat decent pace, maybe I won’t get passed by too many people.”

A little later:

“Come on guys, cheer from me! CHEER! I need cheering so that I’ll go faster! PLEASE! Oh no, not the running section again. Wish I’d brought mud tires...”

As you can tell from my thoughts, Concepcion wasn’t my best race. I finished 12th overall and 5th in the Sub-32 (Under 23).  My biggest regrets were that, (1) even though I had them, I hadn’t brought my mud tires (I didn’t know it was going to be wet), and that (2) I didn’t pull back my intensity quickly enough after the start of the race and bonked on my 5th of 7 laps.