anthonybest.com

Anthony and STP

On Saturday I finally got to do a 4x (Four-Cross) mountain bike race.  I have been jonesing to do one of these for a long time, and this was the first opportunity I had to do one.  I had been amped up to do this race since I heard about it, but I was tired from my Moab trip.  I had been out the night before, and sleeping in sounded really good.  Sarah talked me in to getting out of bed and going to do this.  She knows me so well, she knew how bummed I would be if I skipped it.  Little did I know this would be one of the best racing experiences of my life.

The Reason: Race for Tara Llanes.  From her Wiki: On September 1st 2007 Tara crashed at Beaver Creek, Colorado, host to the Jeep King of the Mountain Finale. The accident happened on the second to last straight down the Dual Slalom course as she raced head to head against Jill Kintner in the Semi Finals. She hit and obstacle wrong and the bicycle landed nose first on to the ground. She was thrown over the handlebars and onto her head and then landed on her back, suffering massive and severe lower back trauma paralyzing her lower extremities suffering a C-7 fracture and L-1 damage to her vertebrae. She was first rushed to Vail Valley Medical Center and then was airlifted to Denver Health Hospital. She underwent seven hours of surgery performed by a team of surgeons who specialty was spinal cord injuries but still had no feeling from the waist down. According to the surgeons the condition is most likely permanent.

Tara was a super nice person and she was in great spirits at the race.  It was fun to meet her.

The Racing:

As this was my first 4x race I figured it was very fair for me to enter the beginner catagory.  Espeically as the class was listed as 19-29 Beginner.  I figured I was due to get my ass kicked by some kids with no jobs and nothing to lose.  Well to my benifit it was turned into a 26-32 Beginner catagory with 3 others in my class.  Perfect for a 4 person total points race.  Each heat was worth points 1 for 1st, 2 for 2nd, and so on.  Person with the fewest poitnts wins.

Heat 1:

I got a crappy jump out of the gate.  However I had the inside lane, so I swung in low on the first turn and made up lost ground.  I was in third all the way through the course but was closing in.  I cranked hard and pumped the rythmn section perfectly and passed the guy ahead of me 5 ft in front of the line.  Good start… 2 points.  I was pleasantly surprised.

Heat 2:

Again… crappy jump out of the gate, but I was really smooth through the first straight and again cut low on the first corner.  I was out into second place, and held it all the way through.  This was in my opinion my best run of the day.  Now I am really excited… and well nervous.  At this point I am literally shaking with nerves. I get this way from time to time.  Before DH races, before hockey games, so this was not something that was uncommon for me to feel.  However when you are sitting in the gate blocks and your bars are shaking… that does not help.

Heat 3 / Finals:

So… I caught the really shitty draw of the outside lane.  Only one person in my class was catching good gates, the rest of us piled in after.  The issue with my position now was that I could not cut low and pedal away.  So I was stuck in traffic, bumping elbows through the first straight, bumping shoulders over the second set of doubles, and finally breaking into 3rd place in the 3rd straight away.  And just not enough time to chase down the guy in 2nd.

Result:

2 points, 2 points, 3 points.  This was enough to earn me a safe 2nd place and my first silver medal.  While I was really pissed about my last heat I couldn’t have been more happy with how I finished.

Raffle:

Sarah is the kindest sweetest person ever.  That needs no qualifications, but she decided to buy $80 in raffle tickets because she figured it was a good cause.  Now… this being said she told me she never wins stuff in raffles and hoped today we would get lucky.  OMG did we ever.  Here is a list of what we ended up coming home with.  Some of this was free shit thrown out.

• 3 t-shirts
• 2 hats
• 2 full face helmets (Giro, and Bell)
• 1 dirt lid
• Point One Stem (trade to get this with a 3rd helmet we won)
• Floatin DVD (Gave this away because I already have it)
• And the big prize… a Giant STP dirt jump frame.

I am still in shock.  The shittiest part of the raffle was the couple that put on the benifit also bought a large number of raffle tickets.  They probably one 1 out of ever 10 things raffled.  Including the two biggest prizes.  A fully built Giant STP (worth about 1600 bucks) and a Giant for Women Full Suspension bike (worth about 2600 bucks).  This did not go over well with the crowd.  The Giant rep was so upset about this that he tried to go get the STP and re-raffle it.  However she threw some kind of fit saying it was for her son.  Because of course no one would want to take a prize away from a kid.  That being said the event raised $8500 dollars for Tara, and that is what was important.

I have posted the pictures for the event in two sections:

Race for Tara 2

Schwag

Thank you Sarah for everything.  None of it would have been possible with you.  You are #1 on “Team Best” in my book.