DAY 1 - BACK HOME

Let me correct something from the last post - the next day of racing was the longest and proved to be a true challenge. I hadn't looked at the course book until after I posted the last message so, to my surprise, the next leg - day 6 presented 116km of challenging mountain trails. Peter had developed chest congestion (from dust) and went on the antibiotics I brought. Needless to say, he wasn't feeling well on the longest day. I had two bike problems on this day, one with my seat falling backwards (hits deep holes) and a bubbled tire that obviously got a little over heated on the down hills (sometime sliding in every directions). We survived the day but missing the cutoff time limit by 15 minutes (8hrs 15mins)and received an 60 minute penalty - like we needed one. We bounced back on the last day which was a very fast 48km to the finish. We finished 9th in the 100+ age group the last day (not overall).

The TransRockies website has the results of every stage. We tried to change our team name to VB MAFIA but, 9 months ago they wanted a name that stuck, WHYNOT, and that's where you'll find our times - 100+ WHYNOT.

Once on the website, go to Transrockies Challenge 2007, where you'll see the day to day coverage. I think I read that there were 25 different country represented. I couldn't believe how international the racers were and how very fit 95% of them were - making me feel somewhat, maybe a little under-trained if you can believe it.

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Now, I plan on covering each day with a little of the reality of this event, seeing as how the TRC coverage DOES NOT disclose the real picture. I'll do this a little at a time because it'll require some writing.

Stage 1 - 33km - short but, a huge hike-a-bike straight up a mountain. No one trains hiking straight up a mtn with a mtn-bike, unless you live in B.C. Canada and then only "maybe" train it. Both Peter and I got blisters from the hike (requiring nursing all week) and it was all I could do to get to the top. I was sunburned on the face where I failed to put block. I thought we'd be racing in places like where Peter and I have pre-rode the the days before - with trees and stuff. After getting over the top the downhill started with 32 switch-backs. Apparently after talking with many of the injured, this is where most of the big injuries occurred. Peter managed to almost break a leg and a jewel on this side of the mtn. He was icing that leg for the remaining days. We have pictures of his legs coming...

Continue praying for our troops, and I'll pick up here tomorrow, ciao, VB