Sea Otter: Sunny, Hot 2009 Version

:)

Chris, Peter, and I loaded up the car and headed up to Cali round 4:30 Wednesday morning! Ughhh! Off to a great start, I got a $90 speeding ticket in Vail. Boo!! Luckily this would be the only ticket or bad thing for the duration of the trip, so that was good! On a much better note...shortly after the ticket, we got to see a breathtaking rainbow intertwined with the already beautiful Glenwood Canyon. There was some strange precipitation and the sun was barely coming up, so it was a once in a million thing, I think. :) I love rainbows, btw, I'm sure that's why I thought it was so much cooler than the boys did!

California sunset with the lot of fancey steeds for the weekend

We had a fairly uneventful trip on Wednesday, seeing some nice sites through Utah, and some over-the-top obnoxious stuff in Vegas.

One of Vegas' best offerings...in my opinion: the fountains at the Bellagio Hotel

We ended up rolling into Monterrey round 1:00 Thursday morning. We all piled into the hotel room and promptly fell asleep!! I had early DH practice the next day, so we all had to be up pretty early to head up to registration and what not. I got some good practice in until I flated and watched the remainder of practice, and the boys got a good preride lap in on the XC course. That night we met up with Melissa for some tasty pasta in downtown Monterry.

Friday was another early start. Most of these early starts were my fault (I guess Chris contributed on Friday as well), so I felt bad dragging the boys out of bed early every day, but they got me back on Sunday! I had better practice on Friday and felt really good on my new Ellsworth Dare!! Not only is it a beautiful bike, but she rides really well, too! I spent the afternoon meeting folks and talking to interested people at the Ellsworth tent. The guys at Ellsworth ROCK!!! I had only spoken to the on the phone and through email before this weekend and thought they were great, but now I KNOW they're awesome!! I am so glad to be aboard their bikes and on their program this year! Project Pink is awesome and I'm really excited to be a part of it!!

Chris (in his sexy skinsuit that he wore around all afternoon!) and Peter waiting for the podium

Chris raced Super D on Friday as well, and a new pair of Crank Brothers Cobalt XC wheels were on the line! I sprinted over to where Chris said I'd be able to see part of his race to cheer him on, and boy was I ever glad that I did! The place I was watching was close to the start, so the whole group was still pretty much together coming down the fireroad in a dead sprint to a nearly 180º turn, and Chris did not disappoint with his impressive riding skills. I wondered how he intended to maintain his speed through the corner as it was loose and there were loads of people...and he wasn't slowing down, at all!

Men's 19-29 Super D podium with the loot!

The next thing I knew, he had his left foot out and was sitting on his top tube and just drifted his rear through the corner passing 3-4 people in the process. It was SICK!! I was screaming so loud!! He ended up getting 3rd which meant he got to keep his sweet Crank Brothers wheels! After his Sea Otter poduim debut, we headed back to Monterey to get a little time in at the beach and take a little swim in the sea. It was chilly, but I was really just being a baby. It was definitely a tolerable temperature and quite fun! :)

The beach in Monterey

Saturday morning...you guessed it was on early start, AGAIN! It was dual slalom all day. I crashed in my qualifier and ended up having to race Melissa, so that sucked. She ended up winning on the day, so that was cool. She's had her eye on the Sea Otter Dual Slalom prize for awhile!

Sunday was the boys' XC race starting at 8:00 and my DH race. Chris woke up bright and early at 4:45 to eat his pre-race breakfast and to get all ready for the day. We got to the venue round 6:30, and it was already starting to feel really warm! The boys set off to get warmed up, and I headed round to get my bike, change the tire and get everything sorted for the day. I only got 1 practice run in as some guy binned it badly at the finish line of his practice run and there was a course delay for ever. My new bike was feeling good, but my head was done in and my legs were feeling tired from hiking up the hill for slalom all day the day before, so I didn't pedal nearly as hard as I would have needed to do have a good result. Ah well, in the end I had a good time getting used to my new bike and getting to know how great it feels to ride!

DH race on Sunday on my new Ellsworth Dare (photo credit: Rick Adams)

I got back to the car after my race run and found a VERY sick boy...Chris. By now it was getting really hot, and he had gotten really sick during his race, throwing up all of his breakfast and gatorade and ultimately fainting at some point. He was trying to cool off with the air con in the car, but I don't think it was working very well. It was awful, I just wanted to try and help him to feel better, but when someone feels like that, there's really not much you can do. I got the bikes all sorted and packed away and went to go run the sponsor errands I had left till the last day in the hopes we'd get out of there in a timely fashion that afternoon! Peter ended up getting 6th place in his race, which was AWESOME, and we got out of the venue at a pretty decent time to start our 20+ hour drive home.

Luckily the drive home was pretty uneventful, albeit not painless! We came home through Reno and Wyoming which ended up being faster, which was nice. All in all, it was a really good trip filled with some really great memories that I'll be holding onto for quite some time to come! Sorry for the lengthy post, sometimes I get a little bit carried away! :)