Takin' it easy and giving it some gas!

This past Saturday was the 3rd race in the Winter Park mountain bike series. It's a point to point race that starts at the ski resort in Winter Park and traverses across the mountain and ends in Fraser, less than a mile from our house. It's one of my favorite courses but unfortunately my body just wasn't ready to be thrashed for 2hrs. I've still been battling this horrid stomach virus and until I can get a full meal down, it's probably smartest to lay low and avoid putting myself in another hole. However, I was able to ride out to the race with Bryce, Lara and Corey to watch them start. I then helped sweep the course and picked up trash behind all the racers. I seriously must have picked up 100 gel packets...yuck! The weather couldn't have been any better for the start and 75% of my ride. Unfortunately, the afternoon storm hit as I was still out riding but we have all been praying for rain so I was actually really excited...plus I had my rain jacket too so it wasn't too bad!

On our way to the race, we spotted this HUGE moose right off the bike path between town and the ski resort. I've only seen one other moose before so it was really cool.

Since I am still planning on racing the cyclocross race at Dealer Camp on July 24th, I decided to jump into the Short Track race on Sunday. I figured that even though I haven't ridden, eaten or done much of anything the last two weeks, a 20min hard effort wouldn't kill me. Well it didn't kill me but holy crap is racing full out on zero training/energy at 9000ft HARD! It was a 1.5 mile bumpy course that was suited 100% to a full suspension bicycle (of which I did not have). My good friend Sherri had an awesome race and rocked out the W, while I held on for dear life in third. This was the only race of the series with a pro payout so it was cool to come home with a bit of cash :) The biggest take home was that I was able to crank out a solid effort without getting nauseous (at least during the race). I'm going to see if I can put together a decent showing at CU's STXC this Wednesday and then hopefully not make too big of a fool of myself at the race in Utah next week.

Bryce also scored a win and added some points to his overall series standings. We won a $25 gift certificate to a great pizza joint in town and a free massage! Neither one of us ever win anything in raffles so it was really exciting to come home with a few gifts. We spent the rest of the day relaxing at the condo then sitting in traffic on I-70. Who would have thought it would be bumper to bumper at 9:30pm?!? Colorado really needs to figure out how to make this ongoing issue disappear because it really does take the fun out of going up to the mountains.