BCBR Day 6

I like today's start setup.  First breakfast at 7, second at 7:30, with a wake up call at 6:30.  I woke up at 7:35 after sleeping in my clothes and was done breakfast and back at the tent with my bike at 7:50, no lineups, no hurry up and wait.  Why you need to wake up at 6:30 to start a race 50m from your tent at 9am is beyond me, but whatever.

In theory I should try to limit the streak of my race finishing place matching my age, that'd be a nice trend to invert, however I think it'll be next race not this one.  We'll see how the overall shakes out.

Thomas Tetz of Whitehorse who's riding solo for once without Tamara broke a swingarm yesterday, first time in a while I haven't been able to help someone out with a spare bike.  Looks like he found a loaner last night to continue.

Drew informed us that it'd be a fast start, wanted to get everyone through our 3 minute road closure allotment.  I like having the group strung out at the start as it helps debottleneck the single track.  Having said that, I felt a bit like garbage again off the start, despite a bit of a morning spin.  Was way back in the big peloton and working hard to be there.  Paced tepidly on the gravel climb and first bits of singletrack, then luck rolled my way.

Was dragging along on a 5 person train on a fire road traverse, Jen Schultz was lamenting the accordion effect on the rollers.  I was off the back just to coast faster into the hills so I didn't care too much.  I was eating a little and just hanging around, when all of a sudden I felt two extra gears.  Rode off on next slope and never looked back, rest of the day I had copious amounts of energy to waste without fear of running dry, plus mixed sections of killer Squamish riding.  Gravel roads I just looked up and rode to the next group, then the next after.  Tried to sneak into singletrack sections ahead, looked up and would close in on a rider then go for the next.  We did a big pump track section through the forest which allowed a half dozen passes.  Got to the steep rubble loose part and a bunch of people were walking bikes and told me to dismount because the trail was dangerous.  I snuck by on the right and rolled same as last two years, everyone's perspective is different but accumulated riding and learning over the years (mostly here) make a lot of the stuff just seem routine.  This event is like technical skills boot camp.  Pinned it on every climb and just kept working along, sat in a few groups on the singletrack when there wasn't any spaces or logic to pass.  It's funny how distant "moving forward" felt up to now, but it's fun when it happens.

Best day from a gut feel perspective (last 2/3 anyway), sorta felt like a bike rider, or the one I want to be more of.  Sunny, warm but not scorching, and awesome trails.

No bus/ferry stuff today, so everyone is dispersed out to tents and such to clean up, and I went for massage.  Pat and Andy looked happy and haven't really seen anyone else yet.

If people don't have sh-t eating grins on their faces after a ride like today they either bonked, mechanical'd, or aren't mountain bikers.  Heavenly.

Someone asked if this is a good starter stage race.  I don't know how to rank them, everyone is different in their background experience.  The logistics and routine aren't consistent, people who need that would find this hard.  The overall endurance and aerobic capacity to complete this is lower, it's a shorter race overall, don't need mega sized base to survive it.  However the technical terrain leaves other wear and tear on the body in other ways, if someone has little technical skill and is starting out, this could be a nightmare.  Everyone needs to ask around and figure for themselves.  They're all hard if you push yourself and regardless of which one, a 7 day drain on energy is hard.