Final Race

Yesterday was the final race of the 05 mtb season for me. Coming into the race I thought that I only had to finish one place behind my main rival Big Al to get the overall series lead. I held a slight advantage coming in so felt good about my chances. Leading up to the race I had had very little training or sleep what with a three week old at home but I was hoping that I had enough residual fitness to get me through.

The race started off fast and furious as usual with Al getting a better start (also as usual). We ended up trading spots a few times during the race and it came down to a final move by al on the last lap going into the final technical single track section. My recent loss of fitness was catching up to me and cramps set in so I had nothing to counter the final move. We ended up finishing 2 & 3 for the day so I had met my pre-race goal of staying with him and finishing no more than one place behind him. Unfortunately my plan didn't work for the overall series points. If we had finished 1 & 2 I would have beat him by 4 points overall. By finishing 2 & 3 we ended up the season with the exact point total and since Al had won more races than I did through the season he is given the overall nod. No problems here, Al was certainly the best this year but I plan to throw down next year...