Chickasaw Trace SERC

This is the only time that I was clean the whole day! So..the story. Saturday was around 70 degrees not a cloud in the sky with perfect trail conditions. But, I knew that it was supposed to rain on Sunday for the race. Did I mention it always rains for this race? Saturday night I could hear the wind roaring, and around 2 AM I could hear it storming. I left my house around 8, and at that point it had stopped, but the damage was done and I knew it was going to be a LONG race! When I arrived I saw the sport class going through a grassy open section, and they looked like they were moving like snails, and I found out first hand, as I had suspected that the field was a sloppy thick muddy mess!

Okay, now to the actual race. We lined up a field of around 16 women, around half the field was the Grace Law women! How exciting to have all my teammates to race with! When they said go, I went, but my legs said no! Girls were starting to pass me on the open section! WTF! We hit the single track and Kym and Anina were in the front and I knew they were long gone, but there were about 3 other girls in front of me, and I needed to pass them ASAP. After a short section of single track, the trail opened up for a second, so I made a decision to pass then. Through I first lap I battled back and forth with a girl from Knoxville, Elizabeth. We were staying around the same pace through about two laps. I think she must of had a mechanical because I didn't see here on the results. I stayed in 4th place for the rest of the race. The girl in 3rd was also a pro race, so I was the first expert to finish. I'm so happy to finish this race. I really wanted to quit after the first lap! I didn't even get to drink anything my first lap because my bottle was full of mud. Jeff, my boyfriend was helping me out and handed me a clean bottle for my second lap, which I downed before hitting the muddy single track again. And did the same thing before my third lap. I NEVER want to race in the mud again! Hopefully I can get more photos from the race up here to show how muddy it was!