Winter Park Hill Climb

Winter Park has a well run super fun mountain bike series that starts off each year with a true suffer fest...the hill climb. Nothing makes your legs and lungs burn like 5.2 miles all uphill race starting at 9,080 feet and ending at 11,142 feet. I was super excited for this race because it was my first race on my Specialized 29er. The race went out hard and my first thought was oh dear, I'm going to blow up. I was patient and knew that very quickly women would start coming back to me. Sure enough before the first mile I was in the lead and held it to the end for the win. Check out these pictures to see just how much snow is still up there:http://www.mountainmoonphotography.com/Cycling-5-dollar-downloads/Mountain-Biking-2011/Winter-Park-Hill-Climb-2011/16291074_2dsQ8#1333006154_kRVxZP7

Beti Bike Bash

The 40 minutes of uphill suffering at the hill climb just wasn't enough suffering in one weekend for me so I headed to the Beti Bike Bash at Bear Creek State Park the next day. I was super excited about this event because one of my amazing sponsors, Stan's No Tubes, was a huge supporter of this women's only mountain bike race. Stan's provided prize money that in turn attracted some of the best riders. It was a mini World Cup race with Georgia Gould and Katie Compton int he mix to name a few. The course was not technical at all and was a super fast power course, perfect for my hardtail 29er! There was no place for rest and it was all out for 1 hour...a really long short track race basically. I faded a bit on the last lap but until then I was right in the mix (minus Georgia, Katie and Erin who had a good lead on the rest of us). I ended up 9th in a super stacked field. It was so great to see so many women on mountain bikes! Hopefully, some will see that mountain biking is where the fun is and come back for more! I know I'll be back at the Beti Bike Bash again next year. Thanks Stan's and Team Yeti Beti for putting on a great event!

Neat picture of Rebecca Rush and I representing Specialized