Back to Leesburg

So After Zoning out in the Mail Truck for a good 8 hours I made it to Leesburg, VA for the Bakers Dozen. I rolled in to find Matt, Dan Rob, Sarah and dog Dakota suited up for a preride.

Man if it didnt feel awesome to see some familiar faces on knobby tires!


I setup camp and then Brian arrived with Mark B. from South Mountain Cycles. I headed out for a pre-ride with Mark which proved to be a very valuable experience since my rear wheel fell off midway, resulting in the 29er pole vault on to my ass. I think at that point Liz, Josh and Todd Wells Showed up.

After the ride, I picked up my race packet and ran into world famous blogger and Cheif editor/founder of XXC Mag who was setting up with with Bikeman Teammate Brad

We took a quick trip into town for dinner and we recieved a warm welcome at a local establishement that didnt seem to mind that we were in shorts, T-shirt, sweaty and had our race numbers written on the back of our legs despite the dress code sign on the door.


Anyway, I had no particular goals for this race other then seeing some friends and throwing down a lot of miles.....but I think deep down I really wanted to chase after Vegan Rob for as long as i could right from the start.

I started of deep in the pack with Matt, Dan, Brad and Mark close by...the gun went off and there was nasty crash immediately...I was able to avoid it but Matt wasn't so lucky.....I looked back with sympathy, since this wasn't actually war it was okay to leave a man behind. Matt understood.


So I went out and quickly got caught up in the XC BS pace before getting into my own groove, i pulled over and let Brad and a few others go around so i could settle in. About 2 hours in I got lapped By Rob. I thought this was a good opportunity to throw down and see if I could hang, but that only lasted for a quarter of a pedal stroke before he was gone.

The rest of the Race was pretty chill, I caught a lap or two with Matt and Dan, and took a few breaks.

After Seeing Dan and Matt chiling with beers around sunset I started to think about how I wanted to spend the rest of the night. I put on a long sleeve jersey and knee warmers and set my lights up. As i grabed something to eat Mark Rolled in to put on his lights. He asked for a scissor to cut his number plate off. I started to heckle him that this was where Craig Gordon took Chris Eatough during the light exchange, but he was pretty focused on the task at hand.

As i rolled out, I saw Jason and Brad sporting jeans and sweat shirts, sitting in chairs....they were done....Everyone i knew was chilling out. I thought about that for my night lap. I thought about the Sun shower sitting on the roof of the mail truck and that was it.

It was time to put the bike down and chill with some friends. They encouraged me to keep going....but i just saw there lips moving and the beer in there hand....

Good Times!