Well that was fun. The Downers Grove course has a little bit of everything you could ask for. Its an awesome technical 8 turn course with elevation change. I was hoping the 2nd Cat 5 heat (8am Sunday morning) would have a few more teammates but it ended up only having 2 X'ers, myself and Tom Briney. Briney and I have been racing/training together all season so we new the drill from the beginning. Keep it hot and steamy from the get go. This time though, we did not have 1/3 of the field as teammates like in previous races so we had to race a little more conservatively.
The plan was to go almost 100% for the first lap or two to thin it out and then let others do the work while sitting in the top 5 spots at all times. For almost the entire race this is how it went. Briney got off to a great start and torched up the first two laps. From there it was sitting in and covering the moves.
It was a perfect race for both of us. No one got away and we were always in at least the top 5 and thats how it went for most the race. The outside of the turn up the kicker was the place to make up spots and I did so all race long. At one point during the race Briney turns to me and asks how many laps we have left. I tell him I had no idea but I'd look the next time around. The start/finish comes and goes and I completely forget to look and have to ask Briney how many were left. "Two to go". Oh snap! I completely had not been paying any attention and thought it was at least 4 to go. Time to ramp it up.
The race starts to string out as we hit the bell lap. Going into the turn before the kicker I get cut off from both sides and immediately lose 4 spots. I panic for a second but then remembered that I can make up those spots on the outside of the kicker just like I had been all race long. I take the turn wide and immediately sprint up to 2nd wheel. As it turns out, Briney was boxed in up the kicker and as I came screaming by on the outside was able to grab my wheel and get into the open.
From there it was bombing down and getting into a good position. I was somewhere around 5th to 6th wheel and Briney was in 2nd wheel. Perfect. Going into turn 7 Briney makes a move and hammers it creating a gap. That gap would stay to the end where he held everyone else off to finish for first by more than a bike length. I sprinted for all it was worth and did not lose/gain any spots and finished for my first top 5 of the year. After going through the finish I immediately pull over and start dry heaving from the effort. Just the way it should be. Luke was right, you HAVE to be up there to even contest the sprint. Overall it was a great way to end the race and the season. I can't wait to do it all over again. Thanks so much to everyone for making this an awesome season.