Big Showing at BCSP

(Look at that women's field start! Who says women's xc is dead?)

So last weekend was the annual Brown County State Park DINO xc race. BC always has a great number turn out for the series and this year also had a impressive number of women who showed up with 10 in the expert field! It was a big showing for the race and it's always so nice to have so many women to race against outside of cross season.

I made the trip down to BC with my parents on the Friday before the race to have a mini vacation, celebrate their 25 wedding anniversary, and get some challenging training in before surgery on the 14th (yes, that's only a few days away!). It was so nice to get a change of roads for training and also have some elevation changes to get a workout with.

We rented a fabulous cabin and had a great time in BC and the best part may have been the primo bird watching that I took in with a family of pileated woodpeckers and a turkey mom with her new hatchlings running around all over the property! I was pretty stoked about all this... which made Sunday's XC race icing on the cake.

Jumping right to the punch line; I was blessed with a win the women's race on Sunday, taking my 2nd win in my races this year! I was really, really happy with this since I've been working my tail off to get back to racing form with so much time off the bike earlier this year, and it was great to be able to take the win at a venue that doesn't suit my strong points all that much. This trail is always so much fun, and I had a great time that day in the dirt and put in just enough effort to take home the win at the end of the day without having to kill myself out there.

(Coming through the feed zone on a little climb)

I had a few minor issues during the race with my shifting, but overall, it was a pretty uneventful race and I seemed to just settle into a nice steady pace to cruise in for the win. Being that my mtb rides have only come in races this year, I hardly feel like they are "races" and more like fun rewards for all the miles I put in on the road in between them... not a bad thing at all I guess.

I do have to say it was also very helpful to have the win to make sure my head stays in the right place while I'm soon to be recovering from surgery here next week. Having the feel of victory so fresh in the heart while in a cast with a painful ankle while crutching around is a great motivator to come back once again from surgery.

(Cruising into the finish area on Yang)

Congrats to my mtb Men of Steel teammates Josh Johnson for a 6th place finish overall in the cat 1 field and Dave McComb's 3rd in his age group in Cat 1.

After race day, I was "rewarded" with a nice 6 hour ride in and around BC and B'town. Seriously, I am a sucker for punishment and I was stoked that Coach Mark assigned me a nice long ride in such a beautiful area. I felt like I covered every inch of BC before we had to head back home the next day and get back to the real world... oh wait, it's ALL is the real world and I'm living the dream!

So at this point I've been hitting a very heavy training week with the hopes that the down time I have after surgery on Tuesday will also serve as a rebuilding and strengthening time from a hard training week. It will be a little tough on the pride to hit my team's race they host with tired legs, but I have the bigger picture in mind down the road. All I know is that once they start the anesthesia on Tuesday, it won't take much to put me under. I'll be more than ready for the sleep! I'll be a little toasted for the upcoming Parkview Classic (www.fwcyclingfestival.com )in the Fort this Sunday, but you better believe I'll be there and so should everyone else! This is a great event and has such a nice venue for a race around Ft Wayne's minor league baseball field, it's really is a ton of fun. Hope to see you all there!

“Setting a goal is not the main thing. It is deciding how you will go about achieving it and staying with that plan.”
- Tom Landry