End of the season review

Started the month of August off right by winning the Colorado Crankworx Dual Slalom and a thousand dollar novelty check, stoked on that! The race was a mud fest and I think my all mountain riding skills and ability to adapt to conditions won it for me as I never dropped a race.

Only video I could find: http://broadbandsports.com/node/28443&loc=mostpop

The next weekend Snowmass held the Colorado State Championships. I had been looking forward to this race ever since last year when I got cought in a freak lightning storm at Sol Vista. Team Geronimo and the Juniors had a great showing with a few state champions being crowned. Unfortunately I couldn't hold it together to capture a jersey. After qualifying 4th in 4X I was knocked out of the final by Jon Watt and into the final where I law darted into the back of a roller...8th for me, 6th for Michael. The DH was a great course and was holding together on race day. I qualified 10th on decent yet mistake riddled run, I tried to clean it up for the final but I had a mechanical and had to play it safe all the way down. I was saved possibly and flagged down near the bottom and was rewarded a re-run. Using Michael's bike I had a grea trun going until I lost it, got off line and slid on my head for the second time in 24 hours. A crash and a 14th place result left a bad taste in my mouth as I knew I had a top 5 in me.

Snowmass video
http://www.superhumanmag.com/content/view/1553/1/

We took a bit of a business trip to Tahoe instead of racing out east for a three week planned trip. It was a very productive time as we coached with Gene Hamilton and World Champion Greg Minnaar at Northstar, CA. After the camp we stayed with our friend and fellow racer Graeme Pitts for a week. It was a great time and very vacation like as we slept in everyday and ate very well thanks to Leslie and Gary Pitts. We rode XC, swam in lakes, built trails and did a bit of sight seeing. I would recommend riding 'toads wild ride' as it was really fun, technical and flowy.

The last race of the season went down last week at Sol Vista and it was fittingly called the Sol Survivor. I was in first place for the overall heading into the race and had to do well to retain my lead. Michael was also in the hunt in 5th. First race of the weekend was the 4X, the same course that was used for the national champs. I had an interesting qualifying run and ended up seeding in 1st, just ahead of Ross Milan, Chris Boice, Dave Zeigmond and Michael. I cruised through my first two heats and then met Milan, Zeigmond and Petr Hanek in the finals. There was a big pile up right after the first straight that involved Petr, Ross and me. I had a bad gate and ended up fallowing in on the wheels of Ross and Petr until Ross slid out into Petr causing a road block for me. I tried to jump the pile but got caught and crashed. Everyone scrambled to get back up and onto their bikes, Ross was first to the next turn, Dave who crashed all by himself above the pile up got up and passed me while I was running to keep in the hunt. I could not reel them back in and ended up in 3rd, earning some good points for the overall. The DH was held on the classic course 'Cougar' I had a good practice and seeding run landing in 2nd place .01 behind Chris Heath for 1st, Chris Boice qualifies 3rd. In my race run I made mistakes all the way down the track and was a second and a half slower than my seeding and ended up with a disappointing 7th and a 2nd Overall in the series. I'm happy with my season, made progress and found myself in position to win, thats all I could ask for. Michael moved into 4th place for the overall.

Sol Survivor, 2009 Mountain States Cup Final - More Mountain Bike Videos

Next up are some collegiate races, and the Red Bull 12 hour races to finish up the season. In the mean time, I'm gonna have some fun exploring and relaxing in the valley as I'll be moving back to Boulder soon.