MSC #3 Angel Fire - DH and Super D
I headed out to Angel Fire with Kimber and Addie not really knowing quite what to expect. I’d never been there, but my husband and friends have all been swearing the course is just FUN, FUN, FUN! And I remember hearing that one of our local Jr. X guys won the Super D last year on his DH bike, so I was really stoked to race that (that is totally my thing!). I was a little worried though because on Wednesday my rib (an old injury from a car accident) popped out and I was getting intense pain in my back and side – enough that I could barely breathe and spent a few hours in the ER the night before we left. Leaving me with a massive bruise on my arm where they drew blood to make sure my kidney was alright, since that is apparently where the pain was located. Ugh. But I made it through the 11 hour drive icing my back intermittently and didn’t really feel much worse for the wear.
We pulled in and got unpacked and settled into the condo with Allie and Jackie. The next morning we got up and it looked cold outside. And I realized I hadn’t even packed long pants or a long sleeve jersey to layer with – just the one long sleeve jersey I race in. In the name of packing light so we could fit everything in the car I think I may have gone overboard… But we headed up and were met with snow on the course. Yikes. I’ve ridden in snow once before and it was really fun, but it was on an easier trail that I was familiar with. So we slipped and slid our way down the rocky top half of the course over snow covered frozen roots and rocks and I started to realize that I desperately need to work on riding in mud and slippery stuff. It just seemed to get worse as the day went on and we headed in for a break. Addie headed out with me for Super D practice in the afternoon – which was a muddy, messy, but totally fun course. LOTS more climbing than I had expected, but what are you going to do?? They added in 3 climbs that weren’t in the course last year. I was thinking hey – they’re at least middle chain ring climbs and I should be able to hammer up them and push myself through it and it will be fine as long as it’s not too muddy. And the weather report said it would be drying out… right? The descending parts of the course were just a hoot (even despite the frozen solid hands). There were some flat rocky technical sections and swoopy bermy turns that were an absolute blast to bomb down, even in the mud and muck and snow. I was worried about the climbs, but the overall fun factor on the course had me in an excellent mood.
We woke up Saturday hoping to see that it had dried out, but couldn’t see the top of the mountain from the condo. As we got on the chairlift the liftie said “below zero and snowing up top”. Uuuuuggggghhhhh. From the top of the lift I bombed down to the Super D start to get in a practice run before the race. At that point I was thinking hey – this isn’t bad at all. The ground was frozen, making the climbs nice and easy to deal with. But… of course time was ticking on and the sun started warming things up...
Anyway, we got lined up for the Super D. This was my first ever LeMans start. All of our Utah courses have so much singletrack that they do regular time trial starts for Super D’s just like downhill. I was a little nervous. 5 knee surgeries and my knees aren’t much into running anymore! But they had us start with our bikes in hand and said if you can make it up this hill from a stop on your bike, go for it. Otherwise run up this hill and around the sign and jump on your bike whenever you want. The start had about 2-3” of snow and I lined up with the 7 women in the open class. Once we started I was 2nd to last as we jumped on our bikes. From there it’s a downhill fire road and got on and pedaled as hard as I could and did some passing before we got to the corner and on to the singletrack. As it opened up again, I passed another person off in the weeds and rocks on the side of the trail and then we got onto the first climb. Which I immediately noticed was already getting muddy… and this was the top of the course. I pedaled as hard as I could and kept on going. In the middle of the second climb I started spinning out in the mud. I only have a 33T chainring on my trail bike and that wasn’t helping in the slick conditions. I got off and ran/pushed my bike as fast as I could through the muck. There were people scattered all over the trail at this point – fixing chainsuck from the mud, hyperventilating, taking off fogged glasses and goggles, and clearing the mud off their tires and shoes. At this point I was glad I have plenty of tire clearance on the bike and chose to go with flat pedals. Spinning in circles without being clipped in is a bit more work, but better than sliding off the pedals altogether when you can’t clip in for all the mud that’s everywhere. And YAY for my new Crank Brothers Joplin seatpost, which not only worked great for keeping me in the right position through climbs and descents, BUT - it held up in the mud and muck too!
I finally made it up the last climb and started pushing the descent as hard as I could to catch the girls that dropped me on the climb. Probably a bit too much in spots, as I was in a 2 wheel drift around some of the muddy corners, which isn’t great for maintaining speed, but I stayed upright and kept charging. I launched into the steepest downhill section faster than I had practiced and nearly blew off the trail as it swooped down into the next corner, but the rest of the bottom of the trail is just so fun. I stood up and pedaled to the finish and ended up 4tt 26 seconds back with a time of 24:50.41. (25 minutes is a LOOOONNNG Super D!) So that’s not too bad – I’m certainly not a climber, and being from Utah have very little experience riding in mud either. So I was pretty stoked to get on the podium for 4th place!
After that it was time to get back out for DH practice again. Since the sun had come out we were all hoping things were starting to dry… but that afternoon it had just hit the phase where the mud is spreading around on the rocks. With everything wet, somehow my front brake caliper kept sliding down under the bar where I couldn’t reach it. After stopping a few times to push it back in place, I made a really dumb attempt to get a finger under it while riding down the rocks and push it back up… only succeeding in locking up my front brake and smashing my “girlie parts” into my stem. Yeow. Ow. Ow. Ow. I laid on the ground for a minute trying to catch my breath, thinking – I’m not a guy, this shouldn’t hurt that much, right? I’m fine. I stood back up and promptly fell over again. Stood up again, figured I was alright now, tried to throw my leg over the bike… and fell over a 3rd time. At that point I decided I needed to sit for a minute. Finally got going again and was greeted my Allie and Kimber wondering what the heck was going on with me. At that point it had finally numbed out enough that I felt okay riding and cruised on down the rest of the course feeling okay. Once we got to the lift again and everyone was ready to head back up the pain set in again and I went into the condo to ice and uh, check the damage. Luckily (?) it was just a small cut and bruise but I called it a day and settled in to rotate ice packs to all the aching parts of my body. J
Sunday we got up for practice and HOORAY! It was finally drying out. Allie and I had spent a while the night before discussing tactics of getting through the rocks and without the mud and slippery-ness on my mind, I was able to focus on keeping my eyes up and ahead and do what I had planned and had a few excellent practice runs. Qualifying was in the afternoon and I felt pretty good, despite getting hung up on a couple rocks and having crazy arm pump by the end of the course. I actually qualified 13th of 18 and I was really happy about that, being my 2nd DH race as a pro. After qualifying, I headed back up to the top with Wendy and Rachel and we walked most of the course to pick lines and went back to ride them section by section.
The next morning we headed up for an early practice run, and then sat and waited for our afternoon race times. We went back out early and hit up some of the other trails on the mountain to warm up and then got ready for the race. I started off clean but not very fast – cruised on through the toughest part of the rock section at the top and was riding cleanly until I got to one of the big pile of rocks you have to ride up and drop down the other side. Somehow I got my wheel stuck just over the top between some rocks and as I tried to bump it loose, flipped over backwards and got stuck under my bike. It was one of those adding insult to injury experiences as I not only needed to get un-stuck but climb back up and over the obstacle I just fell off of. Anyway – I got going again and kept trying to focus on keeping my hands loose so I’d have some arm strength left for the high speed section at the bottom of the course. This time was better than qualifying and I felt a little stronger and able to charge through the trees at the bottom, but picking my way through things at the top and getting untangled from my bike cost me. I ended up 10 seconds slower than my qualifying run for 15th place. Ah well. Next time!
Anyway – it was a great experience. I learned a lot riding through those LONG rock gardens and mud. And felt like I was doing better at keeping my hands loose through a long rough course as well, and looking up and ahead in gnarly rocks. The trick of course is to do that consistently and while under the stress of racing, but it’s getting better! Anyway – I’m excited for our next local race this weekend. And it was incredibly fun having yet another girls-only race weekend! I’m so excited to be on such a fun and supportive team and can’t wait for next year!!