What’s Up Next

I believe the mountain bike gods are angry with me. Sunday after the race we got up in Charlotte to Kristin’s car having a flat tire. We got that taken care of had a nice brunch and my Father, Kristin and I headed our separate directions.

Sunday evening I went out to find some good food since I figured I was still in a caloric deficit from the day before. My favorite Sushi restaurant was having a private party and I decided not to go up to the door and ask if I was invited.

I drove to my favorite local Mexican joint and was sitting there trying to enjoy my meal when all the sudden the building started shaking. I thought to myself “the god’s are angry, I should have pushed myself harder and gotten my 100 miles in.” Then I heard a group of girls cooing at the rain outside. I turned to look and it looked as though the rain was blowing up from the ground. Cars were literally shaking in their parking spots and then the power went out as the telephone poles were knocked down.

Holy smokes! When I got back in my car to drive home, I went to look in the rear view mirror and it was gone. That’s weird, then I looked down and it was lying next to my emergency break. The wind had shaken the car so hard the rear view mirror fell off!

When I was just a wee little guy, my mom sister and one of her friends were all picking strawberries in a “pick your own” field in Indiana when a tornado came. We were hustled quickly into the car and given just enough notice to start driving when trees started falling all around us. The owners of the patch motioned for my mom to drive through their corn field so we could escape around the trees. My Mom rolled down the window and said “I don’t want to destroy the corn.” Another tree fell behind us and she changed her mind and drove through the corn and us to safety.

I thought for sure it was a small tornado Sunday evening but I am told it was a “microburst.” This is a really strong thunderstorm that has high winds from the way it is formed, interesting.

Why tell you all of this? I figure I have angered the Mountain Bike god’s by not sacrificing countless tubes in the race this past weekend. They are mad that I have such a sweet tubeless set up and have taken to avenging me.

I think this will be my July event to keep me motivated to train. I have always wanted to do a dirt triathlon and this looks like a good starting point. Surely I can kill the biking portion right? That is if the open swim doesn’t kill me first.

Here is the course description:

SWIM - 1/2 mile ocean swim, parallel with the beach, with the current,50-100 yards off the beach. Wetsuits allowed according to USAT regulations based upon water temp.

BIKE - 13 miles, 3 loops of the south bike trails, entering "Tightwad" and finishing on "Grunt". A combination of fast, tight twisty single-track and and a little open fire road. All the trails are easy to intermediate, but become more difficult with speed. As with all Xterra races the Bike course is marked with BLUE arrows.

RUN - 3.2 miles/1 loop of the south hiking trails that run parallel to the bike trails. This is more twisty single track with a fun dune trail, and a sprint down the beach to finish.As with all XTERRA races, the RUN course will be marked with RED arrows.