The weekend started off Friday with rounding up the fellas. Keith, and I met Jeff and Scott in Nashville for the carpool to Cleavland Tn, just outside of Chattanooga. Jeffy scored us a free night in the same cabin we crashed in last year. The cabin is sweet and less than 30 minutes from the start of the race. We headed to the Ocoee White Water Center where the race was to start, to drop our drop bags and get checked in. There are 6 aid stations along the 100 mile race route. We were allowed to send 3 one gallon ziplock bags full of whatever we could cram in them, ahead to any 3 of the 6 aid stations. After signing in we grabbed some pizza and headed for the cabin where we met up with Matt. We were all pretty tired and hit the sack nice and early.
The next day we were all up and eating breakfast by 5:45 on race day. We headed to the race slightly behind schedule. By the time Keith and I toed the line we only had a minute fourty seconds to start time. They blew the horn and we were off up the first of many big climbs of the day. Scott took off like a bat out of hell, like Scott does, Keith and I just settled in comfortable with our dead last place start. We set a pace that would bring us to the line at our 10 hour goal and were determined to stick with it.
We stayed on pace hitting all of the aid stations for food and to top off fluids. I had just bought some new steel bottle cages and accidentally bought 2 road bike cages which are pretty flimsy compared to a regular mountain cage. As a result I chucked water bottles left and right going down the hills. I finally stopped and bent my cages into shape and managed to hold on to them for the rest of the day.
About mile 70 my minor stomach issues started to become a real problem and by mile 75 I was down right sick. I sent Keith on his merry way while set out to suffer alone. I really don't have much to say about the rest of the ride other than it was pretty miserable and very slow.
I finished just 10:55 just over an hour better than last years 12:01. Keith finished under 10 hours putting an hour on me in just over 20 miles, pretty impressive. I felt slightly better than last year. Everybody from our group rode well. Scotty tore it up finishing under 9 hours. Jeffy and Matt had great times in the 60 mile course also.
After the race we got to hang out with Super Bad Josh Tostado. Super cool guy and amazing athlete.
Great weekend of riding and playing. The trip there and back are as much a part of the race as the bike ride it's self.
Can't wait till next years race.
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