Tamarancho Dirt Classic 2014 - Short Track and Cross Country

[Jim Hewett]

It is a beautiful thing when I can ride my bike from home to the race venue.  This is only possible once a year, when the purpose-built mountain bike trails around Camp Tamarancho are opened for the Tamarancho Dirt Classic.  This year, the action occurred both Saturday and Sunday, with a short track race, chainless downhill race, and cross country race.

I have just completed my "base" period of training, where I develop aerobic fitness and prepare my body for the intense training to come in the "build" phase.  My racing so far this year has been off and on, but I anticipate more consistent efforts as I near my peak period in late July.

My race bike for the weekend was a Santa Cruz Highball with 32 x 10-42 SRAM XX1.  It weighed 19.5 lbs with a dropper post, which I felt would come in handy for the Flow Trail and many other sections.

Simon and I rode up to the Camp for the short track race on Saturday.  It was pretty low key, with many familiar faces from the Summit Shorty and the local scene in the field of more than 20 racers.  I put in some good efforts in my warm-up and I was feeling pretty good as we lined up at the start of the 1 mile long loop.  We would be racing 10 laps on a course that climbed a slight fireroad to a steep fireroad before coming around and down a hill on bumpy, fresh trails.  The lap finished by climbing singletrack to a sharp, slow, off-camber turn back onto a fireroad climb and the finish.

Will Curtis, Phil Mooney, Justin Herrell, Michael Zanetti, Tsering Alleyne, Alex Wild, Carson Benjamin, and the rest of us were all anxious to race for 25 minutes or so, stretching our legs a little before the main event on Sunday.  I charged hard off the start, moving to the front of the pack in 20 seconds or so.  No one was fighting me for the lead and my legs felt great, so I pushed the pace around the race to the last single track climb.  I made the sharp right turn, with Will and Alex right on my heels, and started charging up the fireroad.  I heard something happen behind us, which was the sound of one racer botching the turn and everyone else piling up behind him.  By the time I had pedaled hard for a minute, we three had a significant gap on the rest of the field.

Will and Alex attacked as we came to the steepest part of the climb and made it around me.  We stuck together pretty well for another lap and I came around Will at the same place on lap three.  I pushed hard to connect with Alex, getting within 5 seconds of his wheel.  The chase group was not able to organize and close the gap from the pileup on lap one, so the top three was decided with Alex coming in first, me in second, and Will in third.  10 laps in 26 minutes, which was a nice bit of intensity but not so much that it should hurt us for the next day's efforts.

Simon and I rode over to the Flow Trail for the chainless downhill and found a good position among the bermed switchbacks from which to watch the action.  We cheered for the racers and friends that flew by.  It was fairly obvious that Marco Osborne was the fastest racer on the course, and he won by a healthy gap of 6 seconds over less than 3 minutes.  Fun was had by all and this race brought a lot of people out that would not have raced the short track or the cross country.  Simon (5 years old) rode his bike for 9 miles and climbed 1400 feet that day!

Sunday was business time as we all prepared for the main event, a three lap cross country race utilizing the narrow and technical trails around the Boy Scout camp.  The pro field was very strong, with 30 racers starting and a lot of the NorCal talent in attendance.  Everyone from the short track as well as Levi Leipheimer, Menso de Jong, Michael Hosey, Walton Brush, Ben Capron, Shiloh Kantz, Ryan Chandler, and more.  The weather was a bit warmer, probably reaching 80 degrees by start time.  I arranged for a bottle handup of OSMO active hydration, which would go a long way toward staving off any cramping or loss of performance from the heat. I did some hard efforts while warming up and scoped the start sections.

I have raced this one a few times and my plan of attack seemed pretty obvious to me:  I needed to be in the front for the first climbs to the very steep short climb and get into the long descent down Serpentine Trail in the top three.  Passing opportunities on the long single track sections are few, so you have to make most of your moves on the wider fireroad sections.  From there I planned to keep the pressure on, try to climb fast and steady up the super steep Dead Heifer climb, keep it safe and smooth on the Flow Trail descent, and, above all, avoid crashing on the dry and loose course.

I pulled up early for a front row start position.  I lost no time moving to the front as we got underway.  We were almost to the short,steep, loose climb when Menso came around me, and then Levi as we started climbing.  Much to my surprise, Levi slowed and spun out as he crossed in front of me and I was stalled and off the bike!  I ran the rest of the way up, but lost a few positions before we started dropping Serpentine.  Immediately I regretted this, as the racers in front of me were slowing for every switchback and we were backing up.  Walt was directly in front of me and we both were being slowed down considerably by Alex Wild.  Walt washed out on a corner and I narrowly avoided riding over him.  Alex was not speeding up, and he seemed unwilling to move aside as the racers in front of him moved farther ahead.  I was focusing on an opportunity to pass and not on the trail when I rode squarely into a very stout low-hanging limb that stopped me dead and rung my bell.  Instinctively, I pulled my bike off of the course where I sat for a moment to compose myself and count stars.  7 or 8 racers came by me before I saw an opening to jump back in.  I was disoriented and I had a lot of pain in my neck, but I was still in the race.

The next 20 minutes or so was spent on singletrack with very little opportunity for passing.  A few people allowed me to pass, but most resisted and I settled into a much slower pace than I would have liked, biding my time to the next passing opportunity.  Once we hit the very steep 3-4 minute fireroad climb known as Dead Heifer, I was able to make some passes and gain some positions.  As I crested the climb and started down to the flow trail, I noticed my front tire was low on air from a sealed cut that had reopened.  After trying to rail the first berms fast and almost feeling my tire roll off of the rim, I reluctantly slowed down and was passed by Marco Osborne, the winner of Saturday's race on this same section of trail.  Once we started climbing again, up B-17 trail, I closed to Marco and Ryan Chandler and a NRL racer.  Once again, the pace was not fast enough to make up any time on the race leaders, but too fast for me to overtake any of them on the narrow trails.  I passed them before the start/finish area, but I had to stop to put air in my tire and once again found myself chasing.  More frustration until we once again hit Dead Heifer.  I kicked it in and dropped most of the group I had been following, but Marco dug deep to stay with me, burning a few of his matches.  I put some time into him by the top, but he quickly reeled me in on the Flow Trail descent.  Another leap frog as we climbed B-17 and I pedalled away from him, surely for the last time.  I started the last lap alone, trying to keep up the pace.  A spectator told me I was in 4th, which surprised me.

Lapped traffic from other classes was more sporadic now, and I made some pretty good time back over to Dead Heifer.  I backed off a bit while trying to stay steady, not able to see any pursuers behind me, but also no rabbits to chase in front.  I was again surprised when Marco caught me just before the end of the Flow Trail, and I redoubled my efforts as we began climbing again.  I increased my lead to a comfortable distance, and kept up the effort back to the singletrack just before the finish.  I crossed the line in fourth place, happy to have come back from a couple of mishaps to grab a decent finish on my home turf.