STAMPEDE is a great name...

Well, the first real race is officially completed. I was a little confused during the race but learned a lot. They started us in waves one minute apart by age so I was in the third wave.

I was the first out of the sprint field start to the single track and setting the pace for my wave for the first two miles or so. The race was going very well until we started catching the guys from the wave in front of us! The two guys on my wheel started calling passes for me so I quickly got schooled in calling passes and being aggressive...

I let them go after a long flat section that I pushed really hard on. I stayed with them for three miles or so until we all went to pass a guy and they got by but I didn't! My handle bars hit his and that was it! Down we went, my shift pod was caked and not functioning. I fixed that on the fly but never caught those guys again. I saw them once on a hilly section on the second lap!

My lap 2 time was almost exactly the same as the first! I learned the trail! 2nd in my age and not sure what I was overall! Not bad for the first go!

I am looking forward to Brighton next week! The one guy that beat me was a guy named Jesse who won the Yankee race and he was running with "Custer Cycle" and we raced at Fort Custer! Probably knew the trail pretty well!

Bike was bad ass! I wrenched a lot the week of tuning and perfecting my new parts! I have new Stans No Tubes, rotors, new XTR cassette and a newly tuned lock-out pod on my Fox RL...

SIDE NOTE - If you have an issue with a remote lock out DO NOT take the pod apart! YOu will have a project on your hands! There are springs and parts and tiny things EVERYWHERE and the problem is more likely in the mechanism mounted to the top of the fork!

Anyway, Brighton stage race in two weeks! Talk soon!