Norcal State Championships - La Grange Fall Classic
by takahashi the ninja on October 24th, 2007
Last weekend was the Final Race of the Norcal Series and also a one day State Championship race, which was put on by team bigfoot . Since I was commited to this series already, having completed two of the four races, It was mandatory that I go for the final to have 3 out of the four races completed in order to be eligible for the overall series outcome. But hey, when you throw in a one day state championship race to boot, It seemed like one of those races where you ask yourself - “why wouldn’t you go?” Given this, I asked fellow Evomo Team member and friend Javier Bustamante to come along and we could carpool, since the race was 3.5 hrs from my house - up in Weaverville, which is about 40 miles west of Redding, in the Trinity Wilderness area.
Javier and our friend Rob picked me up at 5:15 on Sunday morning - so we could get up there before 10:00, which is when the shuttles started. I was happy Javier agreed to drive since I didn’t get any sleep the night before, and needed to get a little shut-eye in the car on the way to the race. Nevermind the reason of no sleep… It’s not important to the story! I was doing some ninja stuff, and that’s all you need to know….
After getting there we opened the doors to get out, and it was freezing! When I looked at the weather report, it said the high for sunday would be in the high 60’s, so I didn’t really prepare for this kind of weather! Oh well, we all jumped out of the car complaining at the temp, and went over to registration, got our number plates and began suiting up. I decided to wear full armor, not for protection, but for extra warmth!
By the time the shuttle came, the sun was starting to come out a bit, and it was warming up a little, so that was cool! This DH course was a longer one, it is about an 8 minute course, which spans about 3.5 miles, and consists of some high speed sections which are rutted and steep up top, fireroad and singletrack, oh yeah, and a creek crossing which makes your feet nice and wet so you can have some fun trying to stay warm! Wet shoes and socks - sucks! It was a best of 2 run format, which meant we had a long day in front of us…
My first race run went ok, but not superb… On the lower singletrack section, I came around the corner too hot and since the ground was damp, and there were rocks sticking up in the trail, both my tires started drifting and sliding on the rocks as I came around… I tried to correct this and over corrected a bit and shot on the other side of the trail and had to build up momentum again… ooops, guess I would be taking a second run. Second run went great up top, but the course wasn’t taped off on one section, and failed to make a turn onto the singletrack part of the course… ooops again, I had to slam on the brakes, turn around, pedal back up the hill about 75 yards to the turnoff, and then pedal to build up momentum again!!!! Bummer! To my suprise, my 2nd run was about 13 seconds faster than my first run, so my feeling was correct that my top part of the run was clean and faster than my first.
At the end of the day, Javier ended up getting 5th, our friend Rob got 2nd, and I ended up 1st. With the win, I ended up winning the overall Series also. Of course there were computer problems and it took FOREVER to get the awards ceremony underway… Keep in mind, the sun was going down, and it the temp was dropping it was FREEZING! We were entertained and occupied for a bit since they were serving up Free hotdogs… It was so cold, that Javier had to wrap his weenie in a bun to keep warm!
More waiting and waiting, and getting colder and colder, we were laughing at Commencal rider Clark Wright, who wore this gorilla outfit in the race! Not sure how he managed to pull the brake levers, but I guess to go fast, you don’t need brakes!
After waiting til we could barely see outside, we finally had our hardware in hand, and could get outta there! Sorry, no podium shots cause it was dark outside, and the flash wouldn’t have been powerful enough to make out the pic anyway!
So, at the end of the day, we drove home and got some well deserved rest! I’m still wondering about this last pic… A picture can describe a thousand words… hmmmm is that a banana in the monkeys pocket, or is he just happy to see Javier?
October 24th, 2007 at 11:02 am
Sweet!! Congrats on stealing the podium!
Yeah the last pic… leaves a lot to the imagination…
October 24th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
sandbaggers
October 24th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
Nice!
October 24th, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Time to take those ninja skills to the next level, eh?
October 24th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
Are you sure that gorilla isnt really BIG FOOT!?
October 26th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Big Foot? I think I dated that chick.