Super D #1 Northstar

Yesterday kicked off the first race in the Super D series for Tina and I up at Northstar. After compartmentalizing our day -- working in the morning, getting into race mode in the afternoon -- we headed up the hill and the butterflies started. I found that laughter really is the best medicine and once we started cracking jokes the tension melted away . . . that's the ticket.

However, things didn't go so smoothly for me once we got on the mountain. My Lyrik fork was just rebuilt by a local bike shop the day before and while it seemed a little stiff on first impression, I really didn't have time to give it a good test run until my practice run where I found out I had about one inch of travel! I was cussing like a sailor the whole way down and not even sure I was going to race at that point. When I was supposed to be up at top of the course at the mandatory race meeting I was down at the bike park's quickie bike shop -- although they didn't have the time and resources to perform a real fix on the fork, they took care of me by taking some air out of the fork and putting some lube around the dust seals. This got me to about four inches, not quite the ride I'm used to, but still I decided to head up the mountain to attempt to race anyway. Arriving late I was happy to find they still accepted me and in a few minutes I was lined up for the (lame) Le Mans start to the race.

After a false start (I heard the word "GO" and me and another girl started running, even though the guy was still only explaining the rules -- oops. No harm) I took off like a shot and managed to be the first girl to reach her bike, flip it over, jump on and take off towards the dusty, rocky, loose single track that would be our challenge for the next 20 minutes or so. There was one length of flat fire road in between and that was where I was passed by a super-fast xc girl. I vowed to catch her on the DH but was met with one more bike malfunction - chain jump. After another session of cursing I had the chain back on the ring and was back on my bike, but alas unable to catch her. The rest of the ride was quite the arm pumping, leg pumping challenge with plenty of technical sections and twisty turns.

Tina, who for her own bike issues had to ride her heavier DH bike, caught up to me at one point and we got lost for a minute which didn't help in my quest to take the lead - it was a confusing course for sure!! After all was said and done I was very happy with a second place finish, Tina in third. It was a great race overall and we even made a new riding buddy, Roxy from Oakland. Looking forward to the next race -- and getting my Lyrik dialed in!!