August 21, 2016
Dirty Dirty Weekend, Marysville, PA
August 27, 2016
On the Rocks at French Creek
The MASS (Mid Atlantic Super Series) race On the Rocks at French Creek typically happens in spring. Due to weather, it was rescheduled from May to August this year. This meant dry, fast trails and hot temperatures come race day.
French Creek is a "4 Hour Endurance" race which means the person who does the most laps in four hours win. The laps are about eight to nine miles long, and on average take 45 minutes to an hour. At the same time as the endurance race there are also multiple XC races going on. Having the XC racers on the course means for quite a bit of traffic at times but it also means people to talk to and people to help push one go just a little faster.
The name "On the Rocks" for this race is a perfect name. This course has it's fair share of rocky, technical sections. Which is perfect for Joël and I, that is what we do well and what we enjoy, so we look forward to riding this course and typically do well.
Pre-race routine was uneventful. Set-up our feed station, took Cliff for a warm-up ride, and then it was time to race. Both Joël and I knew many of the MASS regulars were racing, so we had an idea of who to look out for and what we would need to do to do well.
My race went as planned. I had decided to race based on heart rate; giving myself a maximum heartrate to get close to on the climbs and an average heart rate goal. This planned worked well, it kept me pushing hard and giving me a quantitative measure to race by. Besides watching my heartrate, my goal for the race was to not have to walk any of the course for my first lap. This may sound like a strange goal but there is one climb on the course that is notorious for being a hike-a-bike section. It is steep and has multiple waterbars on it. I knew once my legs were tired it wouldn't happen but I figured on my first lap I would go for. Goal accomplished! Made it up without a dab...but only the first time. As the race went on I needed to dab to get over the water bars, then it eventually turned into walking the climb by the last lap.
Joël had a much more exciting race than I did. Up until the last lap he was racing hard and just doing his own thing. He was getting reports that he was close to the top, third or fourth for the entire race. Halfway through the last lap Joël caught another guy, and knew this moved him up a spot. He then kicked it up a notch to try to put some distance on the guy, and thought he was doing well at this until the hike-a-bike climb about two miles from the end. At the top of the climb Joël turned around and at the bottom was the guy he had passed. Now the pressure was on; a sprint to the end and Joël was able to stay ahead. Afterwards Joël was talking with this guy; he said that he was trying to hide from Joël as to not be seen and once he knew Joël was on to him he tried his hardest to catch Joël. What an exciting finish.As it turns out, the reports Joël was getting during the race were incorrect, one of the guys was not in contention for a top spot, so Joël did even better than he thought was 2nd male. I was 1st female. We both really like this course and this race so we were happy to do well.
Dirty Dirty Weekend
Mike Kuhn is bringing back the Dirty Dirty Weekend at his in-law's farm in Marysville, PA. The weekend consisted of a night-time individual time trial on Friday night, the MASS (Mid Atlantic Super Series) endurance and XC finals on Saturday, and a cyclo-cross race on Sunday. Due to other commitments we could only come out for the day on Saturday for the endurance finals; but the rest of the weekend looked like it was a fun time and we are bummed that we could not attend all.
The endurance race was the four hour lap format, most laps in four hours wins. What a course it was. For anyone who has raced at the Osterling Farm, Mike likes to put together interesting courses. Tight and twisty with short punchy climbs. Deceptively a lot of climbing, rumor was 1000 feet per eight mile lap. Quite a few bridges. More log overs in one lap than most people probably typically ride in a month. Sure, not many rocks but this course was a physical and mental challenge every second of the race; but it was also fun and interesting. The aspect I think I enjoyed most about the course was how it looped around past the parking area and team tent area numerous times; it made for great spectating areas and lots of places to cheer on racers. That little bit of extra motivation from people watching is always helpful.
My first lap I rode with a friend, and we chit-chatted the entire time. Since this was our first time seeing the course, many of the trail obstacle were surprises...log, drops, sharp turns, and a sketchy trail along the creek where one wrong move and you would be in the creek. This friend requested I give a "play by play" of what he heard from me during all those surprising sections. He said I would make quite the commentator. So this is how much of the lap went when challenging trail obstacles appeared "oh shit", "whee", "whoa", "grrrrr", "oh crap", "come on Jess", "pedal, pedal", yipee", some grunts and groans and "oh fuck". Yes, I talk to myself quite a bit when riding, mostly encouragement but the expleratives do fly out quite often. I am glad to hear this gibberish is fun for others to listen to.
Overall both Joël and I had good races. We enjoyed the course and enjoyed the day. This was the final MASS race where series championships were being awarded; so we decided to make a day out of it hung around for the remainder of the day after the race was over. It was nice to just sit and talk with friends, many of whom we probably would not see until next year. In addition, there was a band at night, which was a great way to end the day.As for racing, I placed 1st open female and Joël was 3rd open male. For the series, I was first open women endurance for the series and Joël was second open male for the series. Thanks to Todd Strauss and the Mid Atlantic Super Series for another awesome year of racing.
- words by Jess
- podium photos by us- professional race photos by Abe and Firespire Photography