Sufferfest

I headed up to Keystone this weekend, against my better judgement, to do the first weekend of racing in the G3 series. It's a new racing format that is a gravity only stage race of sorts. This weekend it was 2 downhill races and 1 super D. I came to the very sad realization last Wednesday that I am horribly out of shape right now (thanks grad school), and I am pretty much just exhausted in general. I decided to head up to the race for a good training weekend and to hang out with friends, I wasn't expecting much, and I fulfilled my expectations! Oh well.

The race had a lot of money at stake for the pro classes, which is cool. They had Pro Men, Pro Women, Semi-Pro, and Vet Pro Open. Each with a substantial payout. In my mind Vet Pro Open means anyone who meets the age requirement (35 or older) can enter from Pros to Ams. Well, a friend of mine who happens to be Pro decided to enter this category because he is 36. Well, he was way faster than anyone else in the group on the first DH, but he came in 2nd on the Super D. Throughout the weekend people kept saying that he was sandbagging. I don't really see how they can say this, though, as he fits the category title perfectly. I guess they were just mad that he might take the top $$ on the podium. Well, I heard one of the most disturbing things from a very "involved" in the DH MTB scene person at the start of the last race. My friend ended up getting hurt during practice yesterday morning, so we wasn't able to finish the race (and most likely hold onto the lead for the weekend). This person (who was in his category) said, "I won't say it, but someone probably will, it's probably just karma coming back to him," implying that my friend got hurt because he was sandbagging. I thought that was not only a really stupid thing to say while sitting with a bunch of people who all race together all summer, but just downright mean! Man, sometimes girls can be catty and stupid about racing, but that was the worst thing I've heard anyone say about their competition! I guess "growing up" and being old enough to be in the Vet Pro Open category in no way implies any sort of maturity!