Monday, August 16, 2010

Escalante Days XC Race

Escalante Days XC Race turned out to be a good race for me. I don't do much true xc racing anymore and this was my 2nd effort at the shorter xc racing this year so I was a bit nervous on how I would do. I surprised myself with a great effort. I had to be on the gas 100% the whole time to keep with the front pack of single speeders. The 3 mile climb up to the trail head of Boggy Draw was the make or break section of this race it turned out to be in contention for a top spot. I apologize to the other riders for flipping the bird at you when I attacked on the road. LOL!!! Four of us battled it out all the way into Bean Canyon before it started to break apart. Dave got away from me and I couldn't close the gap on the climb out of Bean. I was hell bent to hold off Myles and Steve on the climb out of Bean Canyon. I was able to hold on for the 2nd place overall in the single speed class and 1st in my age group in a time of 2:07:58. I was 58 seconds behind Dave Lefevere who took the overall win in the single speed class. Fellow BWR teammate Steve Reiter came in 2 minutes later with Myles, Paul Adams and Shawn Gregory coming in next in that order. The gaps between riders definitely spread out a bit in the climb out of Bean Canyon. I just kept the throttle at 100%. I felt great the whole race and was elated to be able to dice it up at the front with the other strong riders. A true confidence builder.
35 miles, 2,340 feet of climbing.


Me coming into the finish.


Me all smiles after finishing with a good effort. I was pretty happy.


Congrats to Dave on a fine race.
Fellow BWR teamamte Steve coming in for a 3rd overall SS finish. Super strong.

Shawn finishing and still smiling after getting whooped up on in his backyard.



Giving Shawn a hard time. Notice the sweat stains on my back. It was a hard, hard effort.



Happy racers. A good day on the bike for all.
(left to right) Shawn Gregory, Paul Adams, myself and Steve Reiter.



Raffle win...seat bag which I gave to Laura.


Age group results. A decent sized class. One of the bigger ones for the day.



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BWR teamamtes, Jeni and Rebecca. Jeni 1st in womens expert SS and Rebecca 3rd in womens expert class. A good day for Big Wheel. 4 of us with podium finishes.




Shawn collecting his prize money.



Paul collecting his prize money.



Show me the money...30 bones for 1st. Beer money.

3 comments:

ojulius said...

Nice job at the race! I borrowed one of your photos for the BWR blog. :)

Jeff Hemperley said...

THanks, Jeni, you the same. Borrow pics whenever you want. Off to Gunny for the 24 hour race.

slppy said...

Jeff thats good to find your webtails i was amused to see the fellow shouldering his bike on your header image is wearing a stomparillaz first gen jersey which is my team of yore, but as of a moment ago i'm working on the new telluride racing team. I'll be on the pugsley, anyhow i'll look you up in town hall one of these days, Max