Leftovers 2023 - Race 1 - Forrest Creek - 06/03/2023

TLDR: This race was out at Forrest Creek and it was a really fun trail. Part of the course was blocked off, and everybody went different ways (wrong ways), so the race had to be restarted. Luckily, that was only 3 miles in, so it felt like an extra warm-up. I had a good first lap and fell apart on the second lap after a wreck. I got 3rd place out of 5 people, and I had a good experience overall. I'm excited to get back out there and try to improve. 

We had to wake up pretty early to get there with time to register, pre-ride, and warm up. My sister's race was at 8:00, and my race was at 9:00. When we arrived, I went off to pre-ride the 'double black diamond' section, which mainly consisted of swoops and one drop. I also pre-rode a swoopy bit of the course with my sister, so I had about 3 miles of the course that I knew of, and I had ridden here before, so make that 4. I was still left with 4 miles of an 8-mile course I'd never seen before, which worried me slightly, but I knew I could still race well. I started warming up a little late and had to cut my warm-up short to get to the start line on time. I had a strong start, and ended up 3rd into the woods, second by the time I passed the timing chip. 

The lady behind me, Hilary, was right on my wheel through the entire first section, which was about two miles long and consisted entirely of sharp, flat corners. I was having trouble carrying speed through them, and I was wasting a lot of energy accelerating out of the corner after I braked. Then, we got lost. The trail we needed to take was incorrectly still blocked off for the 12u race so we turned the only way available to us. At that point, Hilary passed me and entered the 12U course. I called out that I didn't think we were on the right course, so we turned around and waited on the road for the next people. Everyone except the person out front of our group was there, and we decided to go on the trail across from the 12U. We went for about 5 minutes when the guys who were going in the opposite direction told us to turn around because they had gone the wrong way, too. We all went back to the road where we were told we were going to restart. 

We headed back to the start line, and when everyone was back, they restarted us. This time, I was second into the woods, and I felt much more confident on the first section with a lot of cornering, and I carried a lot more speed. When we got to the road, we went straight, like we were supposed to, and I was much more relaxed because things were starting to go right. Hilary stayed right on my wheel until the drop. I hit the drop and carried a lot of speed off of it, so I picked up the pace. There was a jeep road that I hadn't seen before, but it was just a road - What harm could it do? A lot, apparently. It turned a corner and suddenly, all I could see in front of me was the road stretching up, up, up. I turned on the gas, because the faster I went, the faster it was over. I turned, and the road sloped down. Relieved, I went down a bit, and then when I thought I was done, I turned another corner and saw another huge hill. Not as long as the first, but steeper. I sprinted up it, but I was really tired at the top. I went into the next section, and luckily I had pre-ridden this one. I almost wrecked on a log jump but managed to recover. I felt myself starting to sit in, so I went faster. I was really tired at this point though, and I think it was because I didn't get much sleep. Nearing the start of the second lap, I looked behind me and I saw Hilary a few feet off my wheel. 

I got super discouraged, and I started to pre-give up. She's gonna pass me, I told myself, and I'm not gonna be able to keep up. I went over the timing chip and I grabbed my water from the feed zone, but the ground was super bumpy and I was having trouble balancing. I rested my hand with the water bottle in it on my handlebars to navigate a particularly bumpy patch, and my handlebars clipped a tree. I fell off the trail into a soft patch of grass, and I was partially hidden by trees. I just sat there and drank my water, and was disappointed in myself. I got up and kept going, but it wasn't nearly as fast as before and was punctuated with waves of despair, in which I was mad at myself for going so slow, but also couldn't make myself go faster. This made me really sad, and I would start crying, which would make me go even slower. It was a vicious circle that made me feel bad about myself and go pretty slow. I lost about 8-10 minutes in that second lap. 

I learned a lot of lessons, some of them being that I need to not give up, and even if someone is close behind me doesn't mean they're gonna pass me. My dad heard Hilary talking after the race, she was saying that she found it a lot easier to navigate the course when she was on my wheel - so she wasn't trying to pass, she was happy back there! From that I learned to not let people get into my head and just race my race. I also need to believe in myself more and in my ability. If I start to lose it, I need to get it back, fast. I'm going to try to repeat Rebecca Rush's mantra "I can, I will, I won't be denied" if I find myself wrecked and on tilt ever again. This was a great learning experience, and I'm excited to get back out there and try and improve.