Snowmass Nationals- The final Norba National race of the year. MX was disappointing. I qualified 3rd, and then crashed in the finals for 4th. 2nd podium at a national race, so that was good. I ended up 5th overall in the series. DH was slippery in the morning for qualies, and then we had the most fabulous hero dirt for finals. Lisa killed it and was on the podium, giving her 3rd overall for the National series. Jo Jo had a horrible mishap in practice and broke her ankle. She's had surgery and is healing quickly! Oh, yes, then there was the SRAM afterparty. Jeremiah Dylan Dean kept buying more and more and more drinks. We'll leave it at that. :)
SICK SICK SICK- I spent over a week as sick as I have been since I was a kid. That pretty much just sucked!
Keystone Race- I think this was the worst race that I had all year. The only consolation was that I didn't hurt myself. I ended up 2nd overall in the Mountain States Cup series, so that was pretty cool.
Back to grad school- I am very excited about grad school this time. I am doing some really cool research with some cool polymers and stem cells. I'll give a better update later on.
Start of the Collegiate Season- Beaver Meadows, one of my favorite courses. It is so much fun to ride this course. I had a few issues during my race run, including, but not limited to crashing several times and doing some sweet trials moves like track standing to wait for a Men's C rider to get out of my way at a crucially technical part of the track. Oh well, on a much better note. TJ killed it and showed FLC who's going to be on top of the podium at Nationals next month!
MX in Nathrop- CSM put on a race down in Nathrop on my favorite course ever. It was super gusty windy, but we all had a good time anyway. I got my first real win of the season, so that was fun!
Molly's Visit- Molly was in town for almost a week, and boy did we paint the town! The Sun's, sushi, CU Cycling party, hours of darts, lots of good food. Getting to hang out with Molly is too infrequent!
AND THEN...
Final D in Angel Fire- In a few words...Tons of fun, rain, sleet, snow, lots of mud, and quite a bit of drinking for all!
It was rainy and snowy for practice on Friday, but it was a lot of fun to ride the two courses. Saturday we woke up to 3-4" of snow on the top of the course. This made the upper section of the course not quite as fun, okay I'm lying, I was flipping miserable until I got out of the woods, then it was sliding festival 101. Beta course was a bit better. I learned a big lesson at this race. Don't mess with your equipment when it's not really broken. My shoes were soaking wet and miserable and I had another pair of brand new, never used (key here) shoes. I tossed my cleats on my shiny new shoes and headed down for my race run. Funny thing, I couldn't clip in. Hmmm, I ran to borrow Cody's allens and flip the cleats, even though I now they go either way. It didn't help. I did most of my race run not clipped in at all. Oh well, I guess this was the race to learn my lesson at. This just meant that the drinking started that much sooner! Oh and did we have a good time at the costume party!
Brian Buell killed it all day. He raced collegiate and got 2nd to Chris Heath. He also raced Pro Open and killed them all! Then he showed us all how to dance all night at the party.
Brian, Caroline, and me Having a Great Time at the Costume Party!
Hugs and Pictures, A Theme for the Night
Classic Caroline!
Phil as Matt Thompson, me as a Fairy, albeit a Drunk One, and TJ as Gangsta Cat in the Hat
