killthedarkness: a land far far away.

with the possibility of the overall win for the wors marathon series i opted to head to rhinelander for the final race of the mini series. head up saturday for a preride, call jesse to confirm gear ratio. bumpy course but i liked the mix of singletrack and hills. the doubletrack/road sections reminded me a lot of the fat tire. up early on sunday and all i could get down was a half piece of toast. to the course to warm up. front row call up that i managed to not use very well at the start. i shuffled behind cautiously with flashbacks of the wausau marathon. i found myself a bit back in the string of riders, maybe tenth. after a mile or two of singletrack i had worked my way up to sixth behind chris. jesse, mike, brian, and cole gapping up little by little. hammered past chris and eventually bridged to cole as the lead three continued to open up space. i managed a pass on cole which i managed to blow about a mile later as i caught a barend and went down hard. up quick and started to chip away. i could see the dust in the air so i figured they werent too far up. on the open sections i was catching a glimpse of them up ahead, maybe ten seconds. a few miles from the end of the lap i was gaining on a road section. jesse went to the back and started yelling at me to bridge. i did shortly before the end of the lap. my legs already felt spent and they werent letting up at all on the front. heading into lap two brian was on the front as i was just trying to hang on. the pace eventually slowed a bit, allowing me to recover. jesse and brian started opening a gap through one of the bumpy singletrack sections as i was latched onto mike's wheel. i made it around him and chased again. eventually getting brian's wheel and dropping mike. and so the rest of the race went. running into lap traffic, getting gapped a little, and bridging back. my hands/wrists were taking a beating on the bumpy course. about two miles from the end my left hand just couldnt take it anymore. i was having troubles gripping the bar and had resorted to only using my rear brake. they gapped me and i just cruised in. jesse got away for the win about ten seconds up on brian, and i rolled in about twenty seconds after. upon finishing i removed my glove to find a large blister on my palm and an area where the skin had ripped. ouch. with the result brian clinched the marathon series and i got the second. now its time to run through the bike and get it boxed up for travel. tomorrow i set flight for bigger things in scotland. the time for sswc is here. from the sounds of it the course should be fairly hilly and rocky. i will be arriving thursday afternoon in inverness, get picked up by manchester trev, and head to my lodging. build the bike up and relax. friday and saturday will be some recon as the course wont be announced until race time. a huge thanx to b. matter, dirk rettig, mike dretzka, and bill larsen for showin me some love to help out with the trip. i also want to thank everyone that has helped make this trip happen. i wouldnt be going without all your help. time to kill some dreams.