A Win at the 12 Hours of Dauset
I took the win that last night over my good friend Harvey Minton. Harvey and I go way back and the rivalry runs deep, which made the pretty sweet. The suber cool part? Namrita won the women’s solo!
I attacked Harvey on the second lap on short rise and long (relatively) and rooty descent. I had a gap and spent the rest of the day looking over my shoulder. He never gave my more than an 8 min lead. At about 9 hours to go he was within a minute….I saw him in a switchback section while my right cleat was barely dangling from shoe. I attacked anyway, made it in to the pits and continued to drill it through the next one. That created enough of a gap to hold on for the win by 5-6 minutes.
Nam stuck it out despite running in second and not feeling real motivated. It’s tough to race for anything but first once you get a taste of it. She toughed it out, passed the girl and then motored on home. Congrats baby.
My list of injuries is impressive. On my preride I clipped a pedal while standing and landed on my face. I have a bruise on my nose, shoulder, wrist and groin (where I caught the saddle). My nose was bleeding, but the groin shot proved to be worse. Another half inch to the left and….never mind. None of that really played into the race. 12 hour races seem to wreck me. I lost close to 10 lbs yesterday! The worst part is I have this saddle sore like no other and can barely sit right now. The best part is that I have to sit on plane for 5 hours on my way to Vegas. I’m on my way to Interbike to work for Paceline Products and the Wingnut Eco Pioneer Tour and seek out some new sponsors.
Many thanks:
To all my sponsors for their support this season.
Lisa and Clfford for supporting Nam & I and even more for watching the dogs.
To the Bergers for putting on another great Gone Riding event.
To the folks cheering for me out there yesterday.
Eddie O