Boughton Farm BA Series Last Race for 2008

picture by Robert

Well, time flies when your having fun and the last race was upon me. This is the first season I have raced with the A's in the A Masters and it's been a great learning experience. I'll take the 8th overall behind two buddies; Dr. John & Brett D.

I've had some major league distractions; one was in September and one huge one was just last Thursday. I wasn't real motivated to attend this race and was running down the list of excuses I could use for not racing. Gary wasn't to keen on it either. We ended up deciding to go the morning of the race for two reasons:
- The Bike Authority Series has been fantastic; well run with great courses with nice people helping out and we wanted to support them.
- I talked Gary into racing the As with me (insert evil laugh here).

Getting to the course, I noticed that I was going to go "old school" on data....I had left my Polar 725x at home...no speed/heart rate, nuth'n.

We get there after missing the exit....still on time! Warm up on the snowy/icy course and I take some extra warm up laps and a last second "pit" stop to see the guys have already lined up. I come up to the front and ask if anyone would mind if I got in the front row for the start and got the "stare down" and a quick "no" in unison by all.....:-)

So sweeper position for me and I was just going to let the wipe outs happen and then work hard and see whom I could catch. Ray didn't disappoint by executing a fantastic head over heels flip/bike dismount that would have scored a 9.5 in difficulty (he was OK cause he blew by me a short time later). I went by Chris and was hoping Gary was on my wheel cause I saw a gap develop and I wanted to stay close to the main field if there can be such a thing in 'cross.
The story line for today was I felt pretty good and after a while heard a couple of people shouting that I was closing down the gap that John had on me and I'd love to give him a good battle so I picked it up a bit and at the same time Ryan was having trouble closing the gap down on me; he'd close it down in the woulds and I'd open it up on the straights (he wasn't feeling well that day). 3 to go showed up and I had John firmly in my sights (ya gotta have some motivation for this) and was going to keep him close but save some for the bell lap and see if I could give him a bit of a fight for position. Paul, Tony (way to go!) and Shawn came by us and I must have OD'd cause when we came around I thought we had one more to go and instead of one to go it was over with John in front of me and my legs ready to go one more. Dang it.....gotta get my head on straight. Gary did well and came in shortly behind me - thanks Gary for getting me out!

A great race and series Bike Authority & Team Lake Effect....I'm glad I got beat up in the A's this year. I'll be back for more next season.

A special thanks for the Maruts & Srokas....you guys are the best.
Ciao,
Rick