RACE VIJ AND SOME MORE VIJ AND SOME PARTY VIJ

The Sea Otter Classic is a celebration of sport and a great industry, it's pretty much Interbike with racing going on for four days in all disciplines. If you are very lucky, you may get hooked up on a trip like I did, get to work the actual "show" part of the festival while at the same time enjoy some riding and racing. I've got piles to blog from Otter including these vijeos from race day that Dave Griebling of SQUIRT managed to get while sitting in for me behind the Addicted to Bicycles cam...and he scored a soon to be used Helmet Cam which I'm gonna blog the living crap out of as soon as I get to that point. The race course was tailor made for my riding abilities, fast, nothing crazy technical all though there were definitely some attention getting sections and six or seven climbs with only two of them being fairly steep. The start on the race tarmac was outstanding. For a change I had a race strategy that worked almost to perfection and I believe the fact that the 70 California dudes in my race that had never seen me before was a big help as it may have let me slip away early. This is a big event, with big production....so cool to have the podium chika kissin on me like it was the freekin tour or something, and captured on Vij to boot.

The race start was fast and furious with four guys on the same team leading us out around the Laguna Seca Speedway, We ran the course backwards until we hit the lower half of the Corkscrew then it was onto the dirt for 18 miles of really fun terrain, especially on the Superfly from Gary Fisher I had the opportunity to demo and race. 70 sets of nobbies on the race track was a sound I'll never forget, my goal was to hit the dirt in the top ten, and when the pace softened just before we approached the dirt, feeling well rested due to drafting the entire way out there, I jumped the pack and took 4 guys with me. The ensuing 18 mile battle was hard fought as our positions changed, the last lead I saw was about a third of the way through. It was blow for blow with the remaining three and I managed to get two of them and end up with third, just a great day of great racing against great guys. A steady 50 mph headwind the last 4 miles on a high ridge became a war of attrition for everyone...