When you last heard from us we were about to head back to Duluth for race #10 of the MNSCS. This race was the hardest and most challenging race of the season. I had great start, I got the hole shot in my wave and led all the way up the first climb and was the first into the single track.
Things continued to go well until midway through the 2nd lap when I came off a 2 foot drop a little sideways and burped my front tire. I tried, but was unable to get it aired up. Latter I discovered that I had torn my rim strip. My first DNF.
Zach was also having a good race until another racer yelled passing on your left and then came around on his right instead and ran him into a tree. Zach came back to finish third in his class for the day. We found out when we got home that he had fractured his wrist!Next up for us was the Chequamegon fat tire fest. The largest mountain bike race in the U.S. we entered the Short and Fat race which is a 16 mile point to point race with 850 racers and a mass start! Zach earned a preferred start position ( the front 50 ) from his finish last year. The start of the race is the most dangerous thing I have ever done on a bike. When the gun goes off you have a lot of people tring to fit into a small space.
I caught Zach early in the race and we played cat and mouse the rest of the way. His wrist was hurting him and that's the only reason I could keep up with him. We ended up finishing 70th and 71st, he took me at the finish. I bested my time from last year by 2 minutes.
Here I am about 100 yards from the finish.
Next up was the 11th and final round of the MNSCS race series. Going into the race I was only 4 points out of 3rd place for the season. It was a great race season with the top four in my age class battling every race. All of us had beaten the other three at least once during the season. I end up 4th overall for the season after completing 9 of the 11 races. Zach skipped the race to let his wrist heal. Because of all of Zach's injuries this season he was only able to do 6 of the 11 races. He ended up 3rd overall in the points for the season. Well done!
We skipped the first cyclocross race of the season to let the wrist heal some more. So our first race was our home town race and it had been raining for three days. It was going to be very muddy, perfect cross weather!
I set up my Fisticuff with fat tires and disk brakes and had a blast. It handled the mud like a champ.
Zach decided to race the Optimus Ti because we hadn't fully converted his Fisticuff from road duty. As you can see it was pretty wet. Zach had a good race and finished 2nd in 15-18.
Yesterday Zach did the Wirth Classic Cup race and there was a huge turnout, 114 racers in Zach's race.
Zach is still having trouble with his wrist so we set up his Fisticuff with flat bars which doesn't bother him as much. He had a good day at Wirth, 2nd place in 15-18.
