Turned out to be a great morning for a race. Cold at the start (39 degrees), but the sun was full-on and glorious. Warmed you up nicely. I was dressed just right, so I'm all dialed in at least with that.
I found out quickly that the bike gremlins somehow got into my garage at some point this week. Maybe I should keep my bike up on the hooks more often. When it's on the ground, I imagine it is easier for those critters to gain access to it.
My gears were completely messed up. All I did was wash it last week. (maybe I shouldn't wash it any more either?) Instead of warming up I spent some time before the race (maybe 10 minutes or so) trying to make tweaks to the rear derailleur in order to get it back in line with things, but it just wasn't happening. So I had to ride w/o my lowest 3 gears. Which, technically, I thought should be fine on a faster gravel road race. If it were trails, I would have been screwed.
Race went well despite my gear issues. And I learned that if held the gear open slightly, I could get access to number 3 w/o it jumping. It just made me push harder and not be such a puss on the climbs.
I really didn't know how this race would go. I haven't been able to do ANY training for it or for Iceman next week, so I was going to treat this one as a feeler for how Iceman was play out. I felt okay, not much power in my legs, but the rest of me was in decent shape. So I guess I can be less nervous about Iceman now. It will still be painful, but I should be more than capable of finishing it out at least.
Unofficial results: 20 out of 25 in my age group...finished under 2 hours, which both were an improvement over the Spring race. Although, this was a different course....2,250' of climbing, whereas Spring was 1,350'. So I guess I am further ahead of where I was previously, I didn't really think that was the case.
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