Post by erwin455 on Aug 15, 2010 20:20:03 GMT -5
Started my day at 5:30am with a fresh shower. ;D Ate my whole wheat toast with peanut butter and jelly for breakfast and left the house at around 6:30am. Quick stop at Dunkin donuts for a coffee and headed up north. 30 miles from the destination at Taconic pkwy, BigB passed me with his always blazing speed suv. ;D Arrived at the race site and saw Danny and Lia already parked and they already had their race nos. Need to go to the porta potty before the poops build up and get nasty. Lol ;D Picked up my race no. ,headed back to the car to pick up my stuff, changed to my super tight ass shorts, ;D and loaded my electrolytes. Went back to the tent and chatted with the tribesmen and women and waited for the race to start.
Did a couple of warm up runs at the fire road and then headed down to the starting line with Rob. Saw kalog and couple of familiar faces there, but just tried to concentrate and get serious. lol ;D At this race i had a plan, ;D ;D Race starts and Kalog and Rob just bomb it right away followed by a guy i do not know ;D sorry po and Armando ecg guy and then me. So i started slow in fifth place because i had a plan. ;D ;D As Mike Tyson used to saym, "Everybody has a plan until you get punched in the face." ;D ;D At the start of the technical, the new guy and Armando got stuck, so i just passed them easily. Okay, i think my plan is working 2 men down. ;D I could still see Rob, but kalog was gone. So what's the plan man? ;D Well the plan was supposed to be to keep up with 1st and 2nd place and make my move at the last technical uphill and just kill myself from there up to the finish line. But kalog and Rob started the race with blistering speeds. So Tyson was right. ;D But then my brain started calculating those stupid calculations again. ;D I said to myself, "If they start with a very fast pace, they will get tired with those nasty uphills coming up." So i stuck to my plan and just rode at own pace. After the second tech section on the fire road uphill, I could see Rob and Kalog climbing a little bit slower than their faster pace ;D. At this time i had a new plan that i needed to be with them before the downhill section with the drops. So i turned up the gas a little bit and luckily i caught up with them before they went inside the twisty section and downhill. Once inside at the short steep hill with rocks, kalog forgot to shift and got stuck. Rob was following him so Rob also stopped. I passed Rob and i was thinking this is my oppurtunity to pass Kalog but my conscience was telling me, 'What about your plan dude?' So i said to myself, 'Ok, i'll stick to my plan.' ;D It was perfect that I was in second place. ;D So Rob and i just followed Kalog as he was bombing the downhill and the drops like he was riding a dh bike.
There were 3 more nasty drops that were not included in the pre-ride map that we rode. So it was a scary surprise for us because those drops have three arrow signs down which means it's a steep and dangerous drop similar to the DH signs that you see in Diablo. Sadly a pro cat 1 rider broke a collar bone and a wrist there. 
So after this twisty and dh trail is the start of the last uphill, which begins at the fire road all the way up to that tech section uphill that i was saying. I was getting excited and nervous because my plan was coming up. ;D At the uphill fire road, Rob kept telling me, "Let's go Erwin!" I don't know if he meant let's go and pass Kalog now. But i did not say anything because i wanted to stick to my plan. ;D Finally as we hit the tech uphill section, kalog slowed down and i passed him but barely. ;D But hey, that was my plan and it worked!lol ;D Now my problem was if i could keep up with this plan all the way to the finish. ;D As we continued climbing the tech uphill, i looked backed and saw Kalog and Rob walk the rocky section. After that i heard them both saying, "Go, Erwin, go!" So i switched to my trusted granny and just started spinning it. I was about to give up but rememberd my lesson at Kitatinny that spinning the granny is always faster than walking it dead tired. My lungs and legs were hurting like crazy at this moment, so i checked my heart rate and it was beating at 186. Well i felt fine and it's 10 heartbeats down than my last year's when i raced this course. So now that i'm in first place the pressure was just so high. But i kept thinking of my idol Lance and about the mental thing. LOL ;D I stretched the gap a little bit now and was just all alone on the DH for a while. But Kalog and Rob were hitting the DH like there's no work tomorrow. ;D I checked back on my tail and i could see them again. 'Oh well,' i said, 'let me just take risk a little and hopefully it will work.' As we were going down, i remembered the part of the trail where there is a small jump. It's about 2 feet high and the flat rock was perfectly placed like a launching pad. This section had an option on the left but it's rocky and you need to slow down a bit to get over it. I decided to take the jump just hoping that kalog will take the option and i can stretch the gap back again. I started to pedal as hard as i ccould on the DH and hit the ramp at about 25-30 mph and surely enough, i stayed in the air a bit. About 10 feet away, i landed and was really scared of breaking my frame again 
As i looked back i couldn't see kalog anymore, so i said yes it worked. Had no idea that Kalog already fell on that jump. After about 2.5 miles from the finish line Rob caught up, and told me that Kalog fell on the jump. I asked him if kalog was ok and he said yeah he's back on the bike. I was pacing a little bit faster now but everytime i slowed down Rob kept yelling at me "Let's go Erwin push! we don't want kalog to catch up with us." ;D And told me just like yesterday when we pre-rode just you and me. ;D 1st and 2nd place wohoo. ahahaha.
As we approached the finish line, we got a little bit confused. We lost about 30 seconds going in circles. lol ;D At the last straight away fire road, we hammerred it down straight to the finish line. ;D ;D "Hey Rob that was a very strong finished for you with a single speed bike! Only 2 seconds difference between the two of us. Nice job man!"
It was a good day for all the tribesmen today and a very strong finish. Congratulations to all of us who raced and thank you for the family support of BigB and Rob's GF . Job well done to all of us guys and thank you tribesmen for all your moral support. Btw Jon, please send our big thank you to your sister and your bayaw Tagman for the food and BBQ. Sorry BigB and Danny, you guys were still racing. ;D Met your mom at the race today, Jon. She's nice and sweet. (Thank you for all the pics also Danny, Lia, Rob's GF and BigB's wife)
Did a couple of warm up runs at the fire road and then headed down to the starting line with Rob. Saw kalog and couple of familiar faces there, but just tried to concentrate and get serious. lol ;D At this race i had a plan, ;D ;D Race starts and Kalog and Rob just bomb it right away followed by a guy i do not know ;D sorry po and Armando ecg guy and then me. So i started slow in fifth place because i had a plan. ;D ;D As Mike Tyson used to saym, "Everybody has a plan until you get punched in the face." ;D ;D At the start of the technical, the new guy and Armando got stuck, so i just passed them easily. Okay, i think my plan is working 2 men down. ;D I could still see Rob, but kalog was gone. So what's the plan man? ;D Well the plan was supposed to be to keep up with 1st and 2nd place and make my move at the last technical uphill and just kill myself from there up to the finish line. But kalog and Rob started the race with blistering speeds. So Tyson was right. ;D But then my brain started calculating those stupid calculations again. ;D I said to myself, "If they start with a very fast pace, they will get tired with those nasty uphills coming up." So i stuck to my plan and just rode at own pace. After the second tech section on the fire road uphill, I could see Rob and Kalog climbing a little bit slower than their faster pace ;D. At this time i had a new plan that i needed to be with them before the downhill section with the drops. So i turned up the gas a little bit and luckily i caught up with them before they went inside the twisty section and downhill. Once inside at the short steep hill with rocks, kalog forgot to shift and got stuck. Rob was following him so Rob also stopped. I passed Rob and i was thinking this is my oppurtunity to pass Kalog but my conscience was telling me, 'What about your plan dude?' So i said to myself, 'Ok, i'll stick to my plan.' ;D It was perfect that I was in second place. ;D So Rob and i just followed Kalog as he was bombing the downhill and the drops like he was riding a dh bike.
There were 3 more nasty drops that were not included in the pre-ride map that we rode. So it was a scary surprise for us because those drops have three arrow signs down which means it's a steep and dangerous drop similar to the DH signs that you see in Diablo. Sadly a pro cat 1 rider broke a collar bone and a wrist there. 
So after this twisty and dh trail is the start of the last uphill, which begins at the fire road all the way up to that tech section uphill that i was saying. I was getting excited and nervous because my plan was coming up. ;D At the uphill fire road, Rob kept telling me, "Let's go Erwin!" I don't know if he meant let's go and pass Kalog now. But i did not say anything because i wanted to stick to my plan. ;D Finally as we hit the tech uphill section, kalog slowed down and i passed him but barely. ;D But hey, that was my plan and it worked!lol ;D Now my problem was if i could keep up with this plan all the way to the finish. ;D As we continued climbing the tech uphill, i looked backed and saw Kalog and Rob walk the rocky section. After that i heard them both saying, "Go, Erwin, go!" So i switched to my trusted granny and just started spinning it. I was about to give up but rememberd my lesson at Kitatinny that spinning the granny is always faster than walking it dead tired. My lungs and legs were hurting like crazy at this moment, so i checked my heart rate and it was beating at 186. Well i felt fine and it's 10 heartbeats down than my last year's when i raced this course. So now that i'm in first place the pressure was just so high. But i kept thinking of my idol Lance and about the mental thing. LOL ;D I stretched the gap a little bit now and was just all alone on the DH for a while. But Kalog and Rob were hitting the DH like there's no work tomorrow. ;D I checked back on my tail and i could see them again. 'Oh well,' i said, 'let me just take risk a little and hopefully it will work.' As we were going down, i remembered the part of the trail where there is a small jump. It's about 2 feet high and the flat rock was perfectly placed like a launching pad. This section had an option on the left but it's rocky and you need to slow down a bit to get over it. I decided to take the jump just hoping that kalog will take the option and i can stretch the gap back again. I started to pedal as hard as i ccould on the DH and hit the ramp at about 25-30 mph and surely enough, i stayed in the air a bit. About 10 feet away, i landed and was really scared of breaking my frame again 
As i looked back i couldn't see kalog anymore, so i said yes it worked. Had no idea that Kalog already fell on that jump. After about 2.5 miles from the finish line Rob caught up, and told me that Kalog fell on the jump. I asked him if kalog was ok and he said yeah he's back on the bike. I was pacing a little bit faster now but everytime i slowed down Rob kept yelling at me "Let's go Erwin push! we don't want kalog to catch up with us." ;D And told me just like yesterday when we pre-rode just you and me. ;D 1st and 2nd place wohoo. ahahaha.As we approached the finish line, we got a little bit confused. We lost about 30 seconds going in circles. lol ;D At the last straight away fire road, we hammerred it down straight to the finish line. ;D ;D "Hey Rob that was a very strong finished for you with a single speed bike!
Only 2 seconds difference between the two of us. Nice job man!"It was a good day for all the tribesmen today and a very strong finish. Congratulations to all of us who raced and thank you for the family support of BigB and Rob's GF . Job well done to all of us guys and thank you tribesmen for all your moral support. Btw Jon, please send our big thank you to your sister and your bayaw Tagman for the food and BBQ. Sorry BigB and Danny, you guys were still racing. ;D Met your mom at the race today, Jon. She's nice and sweet. (Thank you for all the pics also Danny, Lia, Rob's GF and BigB's wife)
Galing guys!