12 hours of Pats Peak

6/12/24 hours of Pats Peak

What a great venue! 2 lodges (w/AC, a pub and a deck). Plenty of camping, toliets, bike washes, showers, and potable water.

The course: 4.7 miles, 870 feet of climbing, mix of singletrrack, ski slope crossings, and couple short sections of fire roads. Way over average ran equaled some muddy sections, but the new ST downhill section was virtually mud free. It was one of the sweetest, flowiest, smooth, long sections of downhills I ever had the pleasure of riding!!

The Folks at Pats Peak and S&W sports try super hard to put on a great, fun & challanging event and want feedback from us racers to make it bigger & better every year. This year they even had a band playing on the deck and a DH & kids race

I signed up for the 12 hour 2 person male cat. w/my buddy Wiley.
A friend and former teammate (Splat) was also in the same catagory.
Our plan was to do doubles. Wiley went 1st & threw down a fast lap and was the 1st back to the transition tent, and no one caught him on his 2nd lap. My turn to do two laps and no one caught me either. Actually we were doing really well for 10 laps (no one passed either of us).
So we had the overall lead of all 3 races/all divisions, and that was damn cool.

BUT on lap 11 things went down hill fast being we both started bonking. Well whats more than bonking? My last lap was torture, it took me forever to complete, I got sick 3 or 4 times.....and I even went to the EMT's after. Wiley was also totally bonked but still got in 2 more (slow) laps.
He stopped at our pit to wait to cross the finish being neither us had any interest in doing another lap, while waiting he got sick too.

We actually thought we still won but somehow the team in 5th went crazy and jumped into 1st place!

I'm proud of our 2nd place, I definitely left everything I had out on the course.

And thanks Splat, pony tail girl and the other riders that stopped to see if I was ok/needed help during my last lap (I felt so crappy at one point I was off the bike laying down), and the EMT guy that made sure I survived!

ps: This was my first ever race that I(we) won cash!! woot!

pics:
Wiley w/the run win, and you can see Splat in the RM jersey
http://www.douglas1.com/images/P1000383s.jpg

yup, it was warm
http://www.douglas1.com/images/P1000396s.jpg

1st lap
http://www.douglas1.com/images/P1000392s.jpg

Splat
http://www.douglas1.com/images/P1000399s.jpg

me
http://www.douglas1.com/images/patspeak/doug.jpg

band
http://www.douglas1.com/images/patspeak/band.jpg

course
http://www.douglas1.com/images/patspeak/course.jpg

me collpsed
http://www.douglas1.com/images/patspeak/collapsed.jpg

finish
http://www.douglas1.com/images/patspeak/finish.jpg