Finally found a race I could win - well Tom Ober won and I just followed him - that guy is a racehorse!  We went down and did race #1 of the New Mexico Adventure Race series and had a great time ripping around the courses at the Foothills trail system.  We raced as a two man team, and me being older and wiser I let Tom do the map work.  Not only do I get lost in a parking lot, but I'm slower than Tom so as he would stop to figure out where we were going I would catch up - worked perfectly as all I had to do was keep him in sight.  We did take a little diversion though - it wouldn't be an adventure race if we didn't get lost at least once!  We took a trail that looked like the trail we needed, but it ended at a rock overlook and we were, as it turns out, three drainages over from where we needed to be.  No problem, we'll bushwack!  Or should I say cactus whack!  And guess what, those cactus and prickly trees are tougher and meaner than I am; my legs looked like a kitten had used them for a scratching post - of course, the last thing Tom said before we took off was that "no matter what we do not want to bushwack".  Right.  Our shortcut ended up costing about 20 minutes - we were too stubborn to just go back down the trail to where we knew where we were - and we finished the run section about 10 minutes out of first.

No problem though, as where we are really good is on the mountain bikes - and we new we wouldn't have too many navigation problems as all the bike checkpoints were on the trails, so we just let er rip and caught the lead team by the halfway mark.  A few short wrong turns later and we were not where we thought we were - no we were not lost - but luckily we saw someone going the right way and we were able to follow them.  At this point there were people spread all over the trail system and we had no idea what place we were in, so we just put the hammer down and headed for the finish - a couple of wrong turns thrown in just to test us.  As we aproached the finish we though it was oddly vacant, and sure enough (and we're not used to this) we had won!  Cool!  The race was a blast and so damn much fun I can't wait til the next one!  If you've never raced and want to try it, these races are perfect for first -timers, go to:  http://www.nmarc.org/ for more info.  And by the way, Health-fx products work!

Winning was fun, the 12 hours in Gallup (Dawn to Dusk) however - not fun for me!  I have all the usual excuses ( I had a cold, bike didn't work right, went out too fast, I'd skipped taking supplements, the course was different and harder, blah blah blah boo hoo)!  The fact was, while all those are true, I just wasn't ready and those other guys are just faster - not fatter - than me!  In the end I faded like the sunset over the mesa - only I looked ugly while the sunset was great.  As someone said "I was a danger to myself and others out there".  On my last lap I saw a woman who had obviously never ridden off-road before - she was falling off on every rock and walking every uphill.  I felt bad for her until I realized I wasn't keeping up with her.  And yes, she did her lap faster than I did mine!  God, I was going slow....Not fun.

This weekend is the Alien Run mountain bike race in Aztec, NM - a great fast desert race.  Do it if you can!

rc