i'd love to say that the fact that the beer stop was correctly situated in the feed/tech zone made the UCI officials happy, but it was more like they just couldnt immediately think of a reason to kick us off the course. anyway, it was in this beer zone that my most and least memorable moments of the race occurred. gavin and i pulled into the beer zone in second and first place respectively, quite proud of ourselves for the healthy gap we had built up over third place on the first few hills. we grabbed out beers and set about making short work of them. and then dobinson in third place arrived, and before we knew it he was on his way, beer finished, chuckling to himself, in the lead.
having my lack of beer drinking skills rubbed in my face was my least favourite moment, but it was followed almost immediately by a great piece of cornering. the same person responsible again as he sped away, watched by both gavin and i, forcing some swiss girls warming up for their race to scramble to get out of his way as he reentered the singletrack, dragging the back wheel and eventually drifting both wheels around a sharp hairpin bend. beer induced brilliance aside, all the shouting at him in the singletrack, and running with bike on shoulder learned from the recent cyclocross season wasnt enough to catch dobinson as he went on to take a well deserved win.
without the 30 or so singlespeed riders, the sport class would have had only 2 or 3 participants. in spite or perhaps because of the beer forfeits, graciously supplied by iride and williamsbikeshop, sport class was one of the biggest categories of the whole championship. thanks to chris for the photos. for now tho its back to the complex combination training required for singlespeed racing until world champs in ireland later in the year. who else is going?
you should try some Belgium beers for a change, nice blog mister!
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