The reunion bbq at Kents Hill was not well attended. 4 people counting myself showed up from the class of 03. But Wheels was putting on the bbq so it was a good time to chill with him and one of my old roommates from junior year. Saturday morning I thought I was sleeping in and getting up at 9:30, but I miss read my watch and got up at 8:30. I spent the am trying to help the old man fix Maggie's invisible fence. We were not having much luck with it so I went in to eat and take a nap. I was able to get in a kick ass road ride on the terrain I grew up training on. Nothing like going back to your roots for some good ol' training. Well turns out a long time friend of mine Tooth, was flying back from CO for a week and having a party/bbq. So Saturday night I went over to see him and some friends from the Hill. My original plan was to be back at the 497 early Sat afternoon, but I couldn't pass up a bbq at Tooth's. I spent a long time at the bbq watching a game called Pollish Horse Shoes. Its an awesome game and I could have watched it for hours. I made it back to the 497 around 10:30pm or so. I was way tired and just went to bed as soon as I got home. 6:30 am came to quick. As I was running around the house getting my stuff together and the car loaded Hattie cooked the pre race breakfast. Seriously I don't know what I would do with out her. She is probably 60% of the reason for my success this year.

Well I made it down to the Clifford Park Assault race with plenty of time to spare. The promoter was charging $50 to get in, but he was putting 100% of the elite entry $ into the prize purse and then was going to pay 50% deep. Turns out 10 guys entered the elite field, so that meant there was a $500 purse! And the promoter (casco bay sports ) was going to pay 5 deep. I must say there are not many promoters out there who will do such a thing. I am very thankful for race promoters like Pat. Thank you!!

I originally wanted to race the El Santo, but I couldn’t get it ready in time, so I raced on the Mamasita and that was def a good call. I would not have been able to ride as smooth as I was if I was on the El Santo, nor would I have been able to ride half the stuff I was.

The course was super technical, very rocky and rooty. You needed to have excellent bike handling skills to win this race. A big engine would not be enough to win today.

So this is how the race went, Matt O’Keef (very very good bike handling skills) was out front with me on his wheel. 5 min into the race we had a gap on 3^rd. It wasn’t long before Mike Patrick (even better bike handling skills then O’Keef and probably the best in New England) caught up. I lost contact with Matt and Mike on the 2^nd lap, but on the 3^rd lap I caught up to Matt and then caught up to Mike. It was Mike and I trading spots between 1 and 2 for the 3^rd lap. On our final lap Mike got in front of me. At this time we were passing sport and beginner racers left and right. Well I got caught up behind some lower level riders and Mike was able to put some seconds on me. That’s pretty much how I lost the race, due to traffic on the course. Oh well, no complaints on loosing to Mike. I really respect the guy, he is super fast, and has way better technical skills then I.

After the race I was able to catch up to some people I don’t get to see that often as we waited around for the awards. Well Pat wasn’t able to do the awards due to some mess up in the timing. Pat really wasn’t happy with this, and I am sure the timer just lost any future job with Pat. However Pat still did a fantastic job putting on a high quality race. I would highly recommend this race to anyone.

Well that’s it for now, lunch break is about over. Take care.