PMBAR- Pilot Rock, I think I love you

Continued from here.

I debated on the title of this post. I was either going to call it, "Why I love my 26er" or "Pilot Rock, I think I love you". I settled on the latter, obviously, because I didn't want to upset the 29er elitists too much. Oh yeah, I used to be one, too.

Anyway, for some reason I had never actually ridden Pilot Rock. It is now one of my favorite trails ever. It was all downhill, full of rocks, and had amazing views (not that I ever really looked..but I would like to go back soon to ride it for "fun"). Maybe I loved it so much because it came just after the lowest point in my entire race. I could ride without my knee bothering me. I had one (or two?) unexpected dismounts through a rocky switchback but came out unscathed. It was kind of sensory overload--trying to haul ass down the mountain to keep up with Eddie, while tired, while lines of people were hike-a-biking UP Pilot Rock at the same time, and while having so much fun knowing that we had our 4 checkpoints and we were headed for the finish line.

I was really happy to be riding my Rotwild full suspension bike. It rode beautifully the entire day. I would just smile as it happily took the beatings Pisgah was giving it. I would lock out the Magura fork and DT Swiss rear shock on the gravel sections and open it up on everything else...it was perfect. I would not have traded that bike for any other bike that day.

I knew we would be backtracking on some of the trail and roads we did earlier in the day which meant I knew there was still some climbing left. We took some unknown trail from Rd 476 to Buckhorn Gap, then Buckhorn Gap to some gravel road back to Pressley Gap. I was feeling pretty good until the final bit to Pressley Gap. That is when I started to break down again..but, at least this time I knew we were on the final stretch. In case you have not picked up on it yet, I will just say that I was in no shape to be doing this kind of climbing not to mention the intermittent hike a biking. Eddie did warn me that Pressley Gap was not the top and that we had one more short hike a bike up to the top of Black Mountain.

Standing on top of Black Mountain was one of the best feelings ever. I didn't feel like that at the time (I mostly just wanted to get down that hill ASAP--I was over the race and just wanted food, beer, and to see the dogs). I said I would never do the race again. I said I was not having fun. I said I would never race with Eddie again. But, of course, it took less than 12 hours for me to change my mind. The harder the race, the better you feel afterward and the more you love it. It's that feeling that keeps the addiction going. I will most definitely have this race on my calendar again next year. Maybe Eddie will want to race with me again? I don't know, maybe not. :) If not, maybe I can convince Danielle to race it with me! I know Carey is shaking her head right now...anyway..it is going to be hard to top this experience during the rest of the race season. At the very least, I must go back for a few days of long rides ASAP.

Thank you to Eric and Erinna of Pisgah Productions, to Ergon, and to all the other sponsors for supporting one of the best events around. We went home with some delicious Pro Bars and Mtn Air Coffee!

edit: Oh yeah, I forgot. We were the first co-ed team to cross the finish line. If Marvin and Karen hadn't bailed they likely would have beat us in..not only are they super fit and super skilled, they don't even need to carry a map up there. We were actually the third team in, the Koerber's came in with 5 CPs, and then another team came in with 4 CPs.

But, the way this race works is that the teams with 5CPs get a 3 hour time bonus so we hung out for 3 hours after our actual finish time to see how many teams came in with 5CPs.

Enough of them came in to bump us down to 15th place. Still, I was happy with the effort and the result. I was not about to go out for CP5!

Top 3 teams: