A good day out

Irate Intern Result - 3h:25m.54
Place 30th of 142 Open Mens
Place 74th of 304 Irate Interns

What a day! Who would think the rain of the prior few days would break out into a fine, clear sunny day? After all the huffing and fussing about rain, mud, and tyre choice, we show up for a fantastic ride in what you would have to call perfect XC trail conditions.

My ride? Started in the middle of the 3 Irate Intern waves. I pushed hard early to get somewhere closer to the front and mix it with the faster riders. That turned out to be a good idea as much of the fast and flowing downhill single track was spent screaming "TRACK!!" at the train of riders ahead of me in the queue, telling them to GTF out of the way. Some of these supposed 'better' riders were riding the downhill parts like the trail was littered with all kinds of booby traps, IEDs and road spikes. Did anyone else suffer these noobs not caring they had created a freight train behind them? I had never seen it that bad before. Very, very frustrating.

A good laugh while riding was in the middle of the low lying forest, where all the fern shrubs were. About 25km in. At the top of a short hill climb section, some dude had just pulled off the trail and dismounted. On approaching, I call out if he is suffering cramps, but the guy says "Nah, I'm about to be sick". As I pass, me and a few other guys cop an earful of retching stomach sounds and many gallons of liquid sploshing onto the dirt. Poor bugger. And just what we wanted to hear when you are battling your own physical limits.

Two stacks for the day. Both due to the clipped in pedal syndrome. Or is that the idiot rider syndrome? One stack on a fast single track downhilly section where you empty out into a slalom between some thin sapling trees. Following too closely behind, the rider in front of me slaps a handle bar into a tree, loses it, and lands on his knee. I lock it all up and take evasive action. Fall over into a tree, which I put my hand up to steady myself again. It promptly gives way and I fall over. My second accident was about 30km in and you have to ride under a bridge that is nothing but a big mud puddle underneath. On my crappy hard pack dry tyres, I try to skip over the puddle at speed, but lose it and over I go. Get stalled in the mud and fall over to my left into the mud. Pretty funny stuff.

I overheard at the 31km drink stop that there were no known riders that had fallen into the water. Steve? Did you have any repeats of Dirtworks?

My time was 3:25.54 which I was pretty happy with. That speed was about as fast as I could go. Never having ridden this race before, not knowing how many bad hills there were to go, and generally just riding along and taking each up and downhill as they came along. You don't want to blow up with killer cramps on a hill course like that. I thoroughly enjoyed this race - loved the trail, loved the place, loved the weather, loved the group. But I suppose you always feel good when you get a half decent result.

Craig, I was really proud of your effort and place. You did really well. Well done.

Thanks also to Justin for the last 10 km of riding. It made the final grinding km's much more interesting and enjoyable. Although that may not add to the result of this event, the memory of sharing the fun riding is what is important. I appreciated it and hopefully will see you out on the trails again soon.