Tour De Felasco 2009

Company was perfect. Trails were perfect. Weather was close to perfect.

Thus my first Felasco was a lot of fun.

Friday night was the most fun I’ve had in a while. Warmed up at the hotel.

Most of us dressed up and went to the Ale House to get rowdy. KW was in rare form. I’m not sure what he dressed up as but I think he was called the Albino Hulk… or maybe that’s just what I was thinking.

We were some of the last to head out.

Nice and easy. Too bad I can’t keep my mouth shut when I make videos.

They were hauling ass though.

I got some arrow dyslexia and went the wrong way at about mile 8. Popped out back at the parking lot and mumbled, “oh snap”. Turned around and got to an intersection with a bunch of arrows and ended up going backwards on the very first section of singletrack. I rode up on a volunteer taking down arrows. He said I was about a mile from the parking lot going the wrong way and that I was the last rider. He tried to tell me a short cut but at that point I was feeling confident so I just decided to start over and properly follow the arrows.

I was kind of worried about being too far back since I knew nobody would know what happened to me. I only stopped at the sags long enough to get a cup of trail mix and some drink. Finally caught the comedy caboose at about the 5 hour mark. Funny look on their faces. I was hurting and just wanted to get back to the parking lot and lay down.

Got to the last sag and another bunch was there. Funny look on their faces too. With that I decided to stop and eat a pbj. I was already too deep in the calorie deficit for it to do much good.

Rode it on in nice and steady and was really glad to find out the official course was only just under 48. Ol’ MW was telling me there was 7 more miles at the 47 mile mark. I knew there was bailouts but I also knew I was about to put in a personal saddle time record so I stuck it out and finished up in about 6 hours or 5:45 ride time. My cpu said 69 miles but after looking at this guys ride file I think it was probably 67-68.

Didn’t really want to do all those hours solo, in fact I wanted to get lots of pictures and videos of the crew, but at the same time by riding solo I really absorbed the trail. The second time through the tung nut was awesome… just able to really flow it since I had just been through an hour earlier and there was nobody else around. It’s difficult to zone out and really get a feel for the trail when you’re in a tight line of riders.

This morning, when I found that guys ride file, I caught myself trying to figure out a way to do a little more next year. That’s stupid….. but I can’t help it. I’ve already planned the route.

I only took 5 decent pictures and put them here. I’m hoping some folks might send me some more to put in there so they won’t die on someone’s hard drive.