big foot family

Woke up early on saturday morning after a freezing cold night ,weather was fine and I was looking forward to a recce lap of the course and also to become more familiar with my new specialized 29 HT. after a big breakfast and a bit of socializing a group of us headed out on the course . with a few windy days prior to the event there were a lot sticks on the trail, unfortunatley a large stick found its way into my rear wheel and smashed my X9 rear mech bent the hanger and spokes . so I taped the bits to my seatpost shortened the chain and rode back to the campsite.
We headed into Parkes to find a Bikeshop and see what parts we could get. I ended up at Kinsella Cycles they had no parts in stock so they offered to take a n X9 off a new bike on their floor, great blokes, I was very thankfull for that.
Back to the camp and stuck into fixing my bike ,lucky for me my older brother Gary is a bike repair Guru and had all the gear required, new chain, new mech ,straightened the hanger and trued the wheel, all ready to test I rode off got about 20 meters and all the air exited my rear tyre ,with a 2 cm split in the tyre a new one was needed,luckily a distributer was setting up there camp and I noticed they had a crapload of continental tyres ,I approached them and they happily sold me an X king for $50 ...bargin!
Sunday morning was overcast but not cold and i was keen to get started, the 50 km was last to start so I had abit of time up my sleeve and I went for a slow warm up ride with my friend Cecile.
I lined up in about the 3rd row and we were off I pushed forward past a few riders and hit the single track in about 15th position, I new of an A and B line coming up where the A line went over a log ,every
one took the A line and I took the B line I looked across to see somone stall on the log, everyone had to slow and I found myself in 9th spot and right with a group of quicker riders .I stayed with this group for about 20 km having my turn at the front ,but I was pushing hard to stay with them and new I could not keep this pace up I was eventually droped by the group and found myself all on my own for most of the race. I was eventually caught by 1 rider with about 7 km to go, I offered no resistance as my legs were feeling the earlier pace But I did ask him how old he was luckily he was under 40 phew!
I was very happy with my time and certain that I was in a podium position in my class. But at the presentation I found this was not the case . But was still happy as both my older brothers and my sister and All podiumed in their class with Gary winning the 100km over 55's in 4;35 I was very proud of them.
Later when checking the results on line I discovered I had in fact got 3rd in my class and my prizes had been given to the 4th placed rider! oh well I dont ride for prizes... just for fun.