Racing season is in full swing.  If you’ve got a good result, bad result, or just plain hilarious result from the first few weeks of the season email them my way and I’ll post them up here.  The same goes, going forward – if you race, send me a report of your glory and I’ll post.

First up is Tim Leonard’s adventure at the Ramble Around Prattsburgh a few weeks back.  Enjoy…

Scene Racing – The Ramble Around Prattsburgh

First of all, no, I didn’t misspell Prattsburgh meaning to write Plattsburgh. Prattsburgh is a little gem of a town/village in the heart of the Finger Lakes with the most gorgeous dirt roads emulating from it. Well, most of the time they are dirt. Saturday night, somebody snuck in and covered the entire 32-mile course with an inch and ½ of oily peanut butter ……and in a promise that this will be my last reference to Battenkill, the course at The Ramble Around Prattsburgh is the opposite of Battenkill. Instead of ¾ road and ¼ dirt, the surfaces are reversed with the dirt sections being much, ah, “natural”. Also included for our pleasure were sections of cow paths and single tract, you know, that ribbon of a trail through the woods laced with rocks and roots and trees to crash into.

So, the first decision is what rig to bring down there. Road bikes are definitely out, so the choice comes down to a mountain bike or a cyclocross bike. Each has its’ advantages and disadvantages in a race like this. The mtb rigs handle the single tract and with its’ suspension, downhills better, but the cx bikes manage the road sections and smooth dirt better. Since I am not a very good mountain biker, (in fact every time I get on that bike I get injured) I opted for the cyclocross rig. The next critical decision is what tires to run and at what pressure. . I quickly looked at the forecast the night before, must have clicked on the wrong city, maybe Plattsburgh, but the forecast was for no rain. Ok, that makes it easy. I chose my not so aggressive Maxis Raze clinchers and filled them to 60 lbs. I was gonna smoke those mountain goats on the road and dirt.

On Sunday I awoke to a dry and pleasant morning….. but, as I started to approach the Finger Lakes Region, the weather started to change, to first a sprinkle and then a downpour. As I approached Prattsburgh, I looked into the fields and they were covered in mud. I had chosen, for sure, the wrong tires and maybe rig. Too late now. ( ok, I’m usually much more prepared than that bringing along a couple of different wheels, but I had just gotten in the night before from Florida)

I found a good parking place, registered, and then chatted with my Ithaca friend, Ernie Bayles as we tried to get ready and stay dry and warm. We both agreed, this was going to be an epic day.

Ok, to the race. We all assembled at the starting line and as I looked around, I noticed that there were about an equal number of mountain and cx bikes. I horn started the race and off we went follow a motorized dirt bike on a not so controlled start. Dirt bike, what does that mean? We were soon to find out. After circling town crit style we headed up a lonnnnng gradual hill that I remembered from two years ago. But, this year they change things up a bit. Instead of climbing this long hill to its’ summit, ¼ of the way up we took a right, into the woods on some pretty knarly single tract covered in mud, roots, rocks and big trees to crash into. Yes, today was going to be different. I don’t know how, but I made it out of there on the road again without too of an incident. (I was pushed off the trail by an approaching mountain biker). So, now began the lonnnnnng climb again. It was on this climb that I paid for all my sins and excesses in Florida. That singlespeed Surley was no help at all on roads like this. Oh, as I mentioned before, this was not a dirt road I was on, it was a mud road and my wrong choice of tires and pressure was now becoming evident. I was fishtailing all over the place.  Ok, I’ll cut to the chase. literally!. I got spit off the main group on this climb and spent the rest of the race chasing groups. (Sound familiar, story of my life, it is so agonizing to see a friend like Ernie just ride away and there is nothing you can do about it so you look for other objectives, maybe I can catch that mountain goat that pushed me off the trail and let him eat some of my mud.)

So I chased on, on the soupy mud roads, sometimes diverting into the woods, down a cow path, past Amish Carts. For every big climb, there was an equally big descent, on mud. And that’s what makes this race so hard. In a road race you can rest on the descents. Not here, one mistake or slip and you are history. It is just as tiring going down. This is the way it was for the first 1 and ½ hours and then we hit the WALL. This mud hill was 20% and there was no way I was going to climb this in the saddle with the gearing I had. I stood up and stared spinning and had to dismount and walk like Paul Sherwin on the Koppenburg at Flanders. I was humbled! I never walk a hill, I’m too proud. But this one defeated me. (Later I found out that nearly everybody else had to walk also) After the wall there was another 45 minutes of ups and downs and relief as we headed back out on road, yes asphalt, mother asphalt, for what I thought would be a beeline to the finish. But these course designers had one more trick up their sleeve. Just before town,  (I was with the first female, who had run a half marathon the day before so please excuse me “I’m a little tired”) we were guided left into a field and then into a creek bed. Being the gentleman I am, I motioned for the lady to go first. (All right, the water was almost axle high and I had no idea what “lie beneath” – I wasn’t going to be the one to find out what lurked in those depths. She was the one that was going to make some money, earn it) So, she plowed through the water, didn’t hit anything as I followed her track. We finished together on Main Street some 2 hours and 40 minutes later, I, looking like George Hincapie in that famous Roubaix photo (see attached pic). Pretty neat! I was totally wasted only to realize, that in my haste, I forgot my recovery drink. Will ice cream do? I thought so. Cherry Garcia.

I don’t have results yet but I do know that buddies Ernie Bayles and Mark Speranza finished first and second in the 50+. I’m pretty sure I finished out of the money. I didn’t stick around as I was pretty tired and it was raining.

So, for you enduro types, mark this on your schedule to do next year and remember, it’s Prattsburgh, not Plattsburgh.