Well, I've now completed my second race and still loving it. Here's my race report for Mellow Johnny's Classic - 3/3/2012.

I wasn't MTBing back when this location was previously open to mountain biking, so I'd never ridden or even seen the trails. There was a lot of talk in the local MTB community about how difficult the trails were in the past, so I decided I'd burn some of my stock-piled PTO and do as much pre-riding as possible.

I pre-rode the course on the Thursday preceeding the race, doing 2 laps. I probably would have only done one lap, but I ran into a team-mate after my first lap, so rode it again with her. I'm glad I did. It definately was difficult for me. Lots of hike-a-bike. The shoes I prefer to race in were NOT hike-a-bike friendly, so right away I knew I needed to use different shoes to race in. Something with a rubbery sole rather than a hard plastic one would be much better.

Parts of the trail were down right demoralizingly difficult for me. BUT... I have no issue running a portion I can't ride, so my plan was to figure out what those sections were so I had a plan on race day.

I went home Thursday very tired and stiff and mentally worried about the course.

Friday I returned to the ranch to volunteer for race set-up. I ended up unloading quite a bit of heavy stuff and setting up water monters and a bajillion tables. This alone was enough to make me sore. After 4 hours of manual labor, I went out to pre-ride again.

I was hot, tired, worn out, sunburned, and dehydrated BEFORE I started.

The pros were also out doing hot laps at race pace and it was frankly terrifying to have them all go absolutely FLYING past. The trails were crowded on Friday. I'm glad I got a good ride in on Thursday.

I ended up bailing halfway through and not completing the whole loop. I knew I would not be able to recover before Saturday (race day) if I continued. This did not help my confidence level at all!

Race day arrived and I was naseous and had trouble getting any food down.

I got there in plenty of time to warm up a bit and line up at the start. I was physically nervous, which doesn't usually happen to me. To my utter delight, there were only 3 racers in my cat/class who were brave enough to show up! Everyone who finished was garanteed a podium spot. Fantastic! No pressure at all.

So off we go. I had a bit of a clip in wobble at the beginning, so not my best start. The other 2 in my cat were simply faster than me on the lead up to the single track. When I decided I wouldn't be catching them, I just settled in and rode my ride. My goal was simply to finish, uninjured.

To my delight, the course seemed much easier than on the pre-rides. Maybe it was the adrenaline, or just the fact that it was the 2nd or 3rd time seeing the course. Either way, I rode better on the race than I did on any of my pre-ride laps.

There was a ton of climbing on this race. I'm not a fast climber at all. In fact, more often than not I'm a terrible climber. I was passed by a rider from another cat on the climbs, but she was a timid decender, and even stopped and bailed halfway down some of the decents. This was killing me, becuase I am a pretty good decender, and knew I could ride them all.

After the second mid-decent bail out, I worked it out with her so that she could pass me on climbs if she liked, but I'd be passing her before the following decents. Didn't take long till I didn't see her again.

I loved that there was a good crowd for this race. This was a UCI Pro race, so the pros like Georgia Gould, Catherine Pendrel, Katie Compton, and Emily Batty were there. The crowds were great! Lots of cowbells and cheering all along the course.

I finished feeling strong, in 3rd place, uneventfully. Hey, another podium, another trophy! I can't complain. 3rd sounds better than last, so that's my story and I'm sticking with it!

I did find it less fun having so few competitors. I had no incentive to ride at race-pace after I'd been dropped by the two leaders. Maybe that was a blessing on this difficult course. I had all the room in the world to pick lines and no pressure to ride above my abilities.

My husband raced with the men, and he was frustrated that there were so MANY contestants that even though HE could ride many of the technical portions, there were pileups of others walking and so he had no choice but to get off and walk as well.

Overall I'm very happy that I raced this race, and look forward to my next race.

Before I race again I'm attending a Betterride clinic (www.betterride.net) and hope very much that I gain some new technical abilities that allow me to clean more sections of technical trail.