TwoWheeledWorld

Last weekend would take us to Breckenridge, for the final stop in the 2008 Mountain States Cup series. For me, the Fall Classic is an annual fall-right-of-passage. With no series points on the line it was a chance to race with little pressure, and to see if the legs were still firing.

I don't remember whether it was my stellar pre-race crash (where I found myself on the other side of cool), or lining up with Mountain Bike Hall of Famer Travis Brown, but during Saturday's short and intense circuit race I found myself suddenly in the thick of it. No pressure indeed...

Struggling to save something in the tank for Sunday's epic cross-country race I pulled a 3rd place finish out of the hat in the SemiPro field. Saweeeeeeeet...

Fact: chocolate milk is a suitable, and much cheaper recovery drink than many high-end formulas on the market today. So is merlot...............night falls.....feasts are partaken of...

Fact: I know full well the penalty for going out too hard, and, typically, I ignore it. It only leads to catastrophic self destruction, one cog at a time. So, re-instituting the lack of pressure onto my complex human psyche...

...I settled into a comfortable tempo early in Sunday's massive, backcountry loop which was roughly 30 miles of sharp rocks, heionous climbs, and sketchy descents. Pure Summit County beauty; a true test of anyone's skill.

And as pleased as I would have been with a solid finish, digging deep into the reserves over the course of a couple hours yielded a 3rd place in the SemiPro field; and in the money.....saweeeeeeet.

Ain't nothin' like being on the podium with a teammate; series winner KB loves to show the belly hair - now that's SemiPro. And while it's no ticket to an early retirement, getting paid to race your bike just doesn't suck...

And with that, my dear friends, the 2008 racing season, in earnest, is all but wrapped up. Just shy of 6 months ago this kid kicked off the season with a maaaaad suffer-fest out in Fruita and now the series's's's are wrapping up faster than you can say star-fangled-nut.

I'll have some final thoughts on the season here in a few; but in the meantime I've got one more, in what's been a string of races; this time in the form of a non-series Super-D up at "The 'Park." Stay tuned...