Barnburner 104

Friday morning fellow coach Daniel Matheny and I packed up the CTS Nissan truck and hit the road for a 10 hour drive to Flagstaff, AZ for the 2nd annual Barnburner 104 MTB race. Luckily the weather was beautiful and we were excited to race so the drive was not all that bad. After getting to Flagstaff we then continued to drive another 10 miles on dirt roads to the middle of nowhere to the base of Kendrick Mountain Wilderness Area. There we came upon civilization as we saw hundreds of racers, campers, bikes, etc creating a little civilization in a pasture. We checked in, got our packet and then hit the course for a little pre-ride action. After about 10 minutes on the course we realize this was not your typical MTB race as it was all fire roads and dirt access roads making it ideal for a fast paced race.

Race morning was not what we expected we woke up to 27 degrees and frost on all of our bikes and gear, man was I regretting volunteering to go first. I got ready and tried to warm up, but that was unsuccessful. The race started with a 200 or so yard run to my bicycle where Daniel was holding the bike out in the open for me to have a smooth transition on my bike. I made it out of the chaos in 4th place and though I was in a good place. Then I was wrong, upon hitting the roads I was by myself and 3 miles in I got passed by a group of about 20 guys moving like a peloton in the Tour de France, only to drop me like a sack of potatoes. I tried to hang on but could not response as I was still a ice cube. I then spent about 40 minutes riding my own pace trying to warmup and find a groove. Luckily for me when we hit the first climb at about 45 minutes I was able to start to turn the screws and pick off about 5 guys. Then I had a screaming descent and picked off another 5 guys on the downhill as those roadies did not know how to ride their bikes. At the second climb I started to warm up and was feeling better and got myself a few more places to put us in about 12th place before handing off the the second lap to Daniel.

Daniel put the hammer down on a borrowed bike from Chris Carmichael and was able to reel us up all the way to 3rd place. When I saw him come around at the end of his lap I was not to motivated but seeing him bring us to 3rd position I had a fire lit under me and took off like a mad man. I caught two guys that were riding solo and were ahead of us so they hopped on my wheel and I pulled them for about 30 minutes at a steady pace, but it was good because it made me work harder since I was not riding out there by myself. I got to the first climb and really started to open it up, I found myself riding solo but the motivation was good as I caught up to 2nd place which happened to be another CTS team that had a 5 minute lead on us before I started my lap. I was then ready to race even harder and crushed the descent to only find myself cramping a bit before the second climb. I tried to hold my pace as best as possible and climbed steady. I got caught by another guy who passed me on the climb but was still able to keep up in 3rd place coming into the end of my lap. I was excited, because my lap was over and I just biked about 5 minutes faster than my first lap. However, I came around the corner only to find my partner not quite ready as I surprised him just as much as myself by how quick my lap time had been. He put on his helmet, grabbed his bottles and off he went.

From there Daniel put his MTB racing experience to the test and worked his tail off to play some mind games with some of the competitors. He put the hammer down on the last climb to beat out one of his rivals from a previous AZ race to help us finish to a second place overall!
We were super excited not only did we race well but we were able to now relax and drink the free New Belgium beer and free BBQ. The two of us relaxed for awhile and then helped throw out some free gifts at the CTS awards ceremony. We got on the podium and received out big belt buckle and some tequila. We also got a leather Barnburner belt and they had brands that we heated up and got to stamp 2nd place onto the belts ourselves. That was a super cool touch to an awesome event and race.

The next day we were exhausted but woke up at 6am and hit the road we stopped at the Downtown Diner in Flagstaff, AZ to fill up our stomachs before the excursion home. We each ate the hungry man special which consisted of three pancakes, 3 scrambled eggs, 3 sausage links, hash browns, biscuits and gray, and lots of syrup. I had to one up him though and get a huge homemade brownie for dessert. We made the long trek home safe and sound and were glad to be back. All in all it was a great adventure and an awesome race and thanks to Red Rock Company for putting on such a fantastic event. Most of all thanks to my teammate Daniel for making me suffer out there and helping us reel in the 2nd place overall finish. Next up is Xterra Nationals in Ogden Utah