Granogue, 2011

I kept hearing good things about this race, so decided to sign up for both days this year. Glad I did, the first day was rough, but the second one went better. It's nice to have a day 2 for a chance to seek a better result.

The course was dry, fast, and hilly. The first day seemed especially technical, with some bad rock sections, gnarly roots, and plenty of twisting. The pre-reg list showed 128 in the 2/3/4 so I was glad to be staged on the 5th row, it could have been much worse. I managed to get into the top 20 somewhere, and was riding alright (with my usual technical troubles) when I rode straight into one of the white posts, taking me to a dead stop. My front wheel wouldn't turn and it took me a couple seconds to realize that my front brake was shoved underneath the rim, totally jamming it up. I managed to wrench it loose and get going again, but lost a bunch of places. The impact was so hard that it shattered my front shifter cable and left me in the small ring. No problem, but it took my a while to figure out why my front ring wasn't shifting. Strangely, my bar tape was completely shattered as well, it looked like it just exploded.

I didn't stick around to see the results, but in hindsight probably should have because I was scored as DNF. I definitely did finish 2 spots behind Joe and should have earned more MAC points, but it sounds like Marc is going to graciously fix it for me, at least for the MAC points.



Day 2 we didn't get stuck in traffic, and made it with plenty of time to pre-ride the course. It felt faster, and more "flowy", I liked it. Fourth row this time, I spent most of the race yo-yo-ing with a constantly changing group, first catching up, and then washing out, going down, and losing contact again. I'm pretty sure I fell more times then I successfully rode the swooping off-camber part at the top of the hill. I've really got to work on that. Some hecklers had picked me out as the guy who would always fall there, and deservedly point out the errors in my ways through that part of the course. Somehow I didn't learn from my mistakes...

Finished 13th by count of at least two different people, but scored again at 15th. Seems like there was an unusual amount of errors with getting the placings right this weekend.



The highlight of the weekend was after the race when someone approached me and said that they'd call me "Fignon" from now on, called me a spitting image. I hadn't noticed, but I'll take it. I am probably destined for his awesome hair.