Ride Lugged

Seven springs recount.
We arrived at Seven Springs around 5pm on Friday, drove around the mountain a bit looking for the camping area, which was just a huge field at the very top of the mountain. Casey saw us driving around and directed us to the area he sectioned off with about 10 gallon jugs of water. It was bitterly cold for the summer, maybe somewhere in the 50s and raining a bit. We setup the tents and the canopy and were out of the rain. We had dinner of burgers and chili, drank some beer and played cards. Nick rolled in somewhere after 10pm. It was still raining and still cold and now the ground under the canopy was starting to get mushy.

We slept through driving rain and strong winds. Rachel and I thought the canopy was going to lift off the ground and smash us in our tent. In the morning everything had been knocked over under the canopy, beer bottles and cards floating in an inch of water. We moved everything to higher ground had some breakfast and got ready for the race. We drew straws and the order was Casey, Gary, Nick then me (James).

Casey started the race with the sprint to his bike. The fog was thick and there was still a light rain. We all waited at the transition tent for Casey to roll in. We waited a really long time, we saw some medical trucks roll out and we thought he might have take a bad spill. When he finally got back he was covered in mud and he had had three flat tires. The phrase peanut butter like mud was uttered and stuck in my head for the rest of the race because that is exactly what the course was like.

Gary then rolled out on his freshly converted fixed gear surly. Nick was able to convince him that he should leave the front break on. Gary went on to log the best time for our team for the whole race, I think it was and hour and a half. On his last uphill climb he was rick behind tinker jaurez but he didn’t pass him out of respect or something like that.

Nick was next out he was visibly nervous with good reason. Pretty much everyone who riding up the hill to the transition tent either looked totally worked over and pissed off or they looked giddy with excitement, meaning they had gone insane. Nick got back with a good time, I don’t remember but it was excellent considering he could probably count the number of off road rides he had done in the past ten years on one hand.

I was next and the first few miles were actually kind of fun minus the jarring rock gardens which I walked a large portion of. The pain of the course didn’t really set in until about mile 9 that is when the real peanut butter mud starts. The trail proceeds through this stuff until about mile 11 when it then takes a turn up a ridiculous switch back up a black diamond. That is the last mile until you get into the transition tent. It’s one of those climbs that some people are able to ride the whole thing but for the most part you can walk about as fast as they are riding. I did have the honor of passing and EVLI on that uphill. He muttered something about telling them elvi is coming.

Rachel was waiting for me at the transition tent and Casey was in there ready to roll out. When casey got back the idea of calling this the last lap was tossed around. It wasn’t settled until gary got back and said he didn’t think he could do another lap. So Nick did his last lap somewhere between 1am and 4am and I did mine between 4:15am and 6:45am and that was it for us.

We broke down camp and we were ready to leave around 10 or 11am. Just as we were ready to leave the sun came out and the fog and rain cleared. God had just smote us for quiting.

if you didn’t see it below check the pictures from the race on flickr