Glocester Grind 2013 Race Report

Singlespeed Open 32x18

My first time doing the Glocester Grind.  Heard it was technical and muddy.  Surely it couldn't be muddy this year! Wrong.  Muddy.  And yeah, technical.  But I felt confident because I spent a good portion of Friday getting race ready:

Julian with a slight lead on me and Layni in her iBert seat.

Gabe and I were the sole Team Sea Sports representatives for the day. I gotta say, our Champion Systems kit is pretty darn sharp.  And comfy. I feel like I'm riding in pajamas.

SS Open class had 6 or 7 guys.  We go.  Shawn Mottram gets the holeshot and yardsales the first root.  That was pretty funny - especially since we knew he was going to kill us all.  He got back on and pushed his big gear over the roots and through the rocks and to grandmother's house and to a galaxy far far away from us.

I ended up on 3rd wheel behind an NBX rider. He was going at a decent pace so I sat in and got my bearings. Taylor Clark passed on a short uphill and as he threaded between two rocks, his bike lurched sideways and SNAP! went his chain.  He would DNF. That sucked for him as I have a feeling he was going to do really well.

I pushed on behind NBX guy, but wanted to pass so I could get a better view of the lines through the tech.  Just when I was deciding to pass, he went down in a rooty corner.  I went by and put a push in.  I then rode by myself for a long time.

On the 2nd lap I passed elite rider Alby King as he was finishing a trailside repair.  He went by me soon after and I kept him in sight for a while. That was cool as he was riding muddy technical sections that I chose to run the first lap.  So I rode them too.  He eventually put elite watts down and dropped me.

Also caught up to Mo Bruno Roy in a muddy rock garden.  We both had to run it. She remounts like a CX pro.  I remount like a drunk elephant. Gotta work on that.

So after all the mud and roots and rocks, I crossed in 2nd place (my fifth 2nd place finish in a row!?), about 8 earth minutes down on Shawn. Results here. Shawn was top expert. Sick. I wish we could give him a better run for it, but he's just waaay stronger.

Here's the podium pic:

(that's a joke some will get)

Overall I was happy with the day - I'm not the best technical rider, so I'm not used to that kind of riding.  But it really did get more fun as the race went on, so I found myself wishing there were trails like that on Cape.

While I was racing Glocester, my wife was racing a sub-27 minute 5K in the extremely popular and awesome YPD (Yarmouth Police Dept) 5K (the video looks like it was taken on the Zapruders' camera). Her time was a personal record for her, accomplished no less on World IBD day (she has Crohn's disease).  She is clearly kicking Crohn's ass.

Next race...hmmm.  I really want to do Domnarski, but it's not lining up well for me right now.  Gotta try to figure something out. I really want to do Pinnacle too, but it's well outside my 2 hour(ish) travel limit.

Thanks for reading!