Last Saturday I got out for the Winter Park Mary Jane race. It's a tuff little two laps around a circuit at the top of Mary Jane followed by a long descent back to the base of Winter Park. The race started out great, I was in about 5th place going into the single track at the top of the circuit. I had my friend and teammate Josh just in front of me. He's a lot better descender so I thought we were in good shape as I would be a good road block as he took off. He quickly opened a gap and I was feeling good about it. I was bombing down the path (that is to say, taking baby steps down the 'meat grinder') when I see a rider fixing a flat.... NOOO Josh was working quickly on his back tire. I kept up my pace onto the steep dirt road at the bottom of the circuit, but honestly I think I was a little blown from the start. After fixing his back tire, Josh came around me to chase that lead group. I made it back to the top in pretty good position and completed the first circuit lap about 4 minutes faster than last year.
On the descent starting the second loop, things came apart... literally. My back tire went flat. I stopped and could see the Stan's bubbling out of a small hole in the middle of the tire. I tried to spin the wheel and stop it so the hole was at the bottom and the Stan's could fill it. It seemed to stop and I pulled out my pump and got to work. The tire appeared to fill up and I went back down the trail only to have it flat again at the bottom of the circuit. I tried to pump it up 3 more times, each time failing a few hundred meters down the trail. So I stopped, pulled the tire off and put a tube in so I could finish the race. That was the goal, just finish. I ended up 20th and DFL. Just finishing was better than a lot of racer out there. I saw a lot of people on the side of the trail fixing flats. Time for new tires?
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