NYCMTB.com

[mattny]

Drove out with Stephane for the Jungle Habitat race today. The event was well-run, and I was excited since it was my first race on my new bike. I had a good warmup, doing about half a lap but was slightly late to the lineup and wound up in the second line of racers for my age group (35-39 Cat2). Off the start I was in about 5th or 6th I think and got a bit bottled-up in the singletrack. But over time I was catching people, especially on the short climbing sections. The course was very rocky overall, especially the 2nd half of the lap. I knew it was a relatively short race (about 12 miles) so I tried to apply speed whenever I could. My new bike's a 29er and it felt great in the rock gardens, helping me carry momentum though them, and the bike also felt very stable on descents. Although this course seemed to have only one fast, straight descent, with a sharp left turn at the end.

Midway through the first lap I was passed by Jeff Lenosky coming through with the lead from the 40-44 group when he very amicably asked if we could make way for a "old guy". I managed to latch on to his wheel as he passed a couple more riders and then he was off. About halfway through the 2nd lap I spotted a rider I knew was in my group a bit maybe 150m ahead in the switchbacks and just set my mind to catching him. I was slowly closing the gap, but it seemed I would bobble over some rocks every now and then and thought I might not catch him. Eventually we came to a rocky but not too steep descent with switchbacks every so often and lots of skinny trees that made the line quite narrow. I backed off a bit, in case he had trouble I didn't want to lose momentum. Eventually he had a tip-over, and I quickly asked if he was ok (he was) and I passed. From there I just did what I could to see if I could find the next rider in my class, but I was didn't... wouldn't have recognized him anyhow. I ran through some of the turning, rocky sections leading back to the start when I had to put a foot down since it was really tough to get started again in parts. I finished and didn't really have a clue as how to how I did, but was thrilled to find out it was 3rd -- my first cat 2 podium. Apparently bringing a "podium jersey" was not a total jinx

Thanks to Beth for taking some pics --
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150374508358783.411947.677913782&l=5f6f22742e&type=1

[raygun]

I knew you were going to podium after that pre-ride last week, effortlessly clearing all the tech stuff. Nice job!

Couldn't make it out yesterday. Hope to do Chainstretcher.

Curious, what was Lenosky's setup?

[mattny]

[jbogner]

That's awesome Matt- nice work!
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