Brad Brown In Santa Ynez

This is Bradford (aka Bad Brad) Brown's first attempt at an abbreviated race report. What a beautiful day it was in Santa Ynez. No flies, just heat. Lots of heat.

My race preparation started Saturday night and ended at 12:30 a.m. Sunday Morning. I'll just let your imaginations go wild on that one. Anyway, I got at least 3.5 hours of sleep before throwing the trusty old Santa Cruz Blur onto the bike rack and heading to Santa Ynez by 6:45 a.m..... I made the obligatory coffee stop and still arrived in time to register and race.

After registering, I warmed up for 10 minutes, or less, and headed to the Start Line to hang out and talk with my fellow group 237 ers (aka Beginner Men XC age 45 - 49). Our race started at 8:36 am and it ended for me about 1 hour and 7 minutes later, give or take a few tenths of a second.

The start was just fine and didn't prove to be troublesome, but the first and longest winding hill just about killed me. I was maybe in third place as our group approached the first hill and I was spinning with a comfortable cadence. At 1/3 of the way up the hill, I began to overheat badly. My head felt like on oven in the "self clean" cycle and throbbed from the blood coursing through my brain with each heart beat. My chest swelled and my legs jellowed (sorry for that Jelly). I thought for sure I was done and would never make the crest of the first hill. I was cursing myself for the activities just a few hours earlier.

So I slowed down a few clicks and I was instantly passed by what seemed to be most of my 237 group pals. Ouch!!!! As each rider passed me, it became abundantly clear I might actually finish last. But I wasn't done so I kept climbing. As I crested that first hill I slowly began feeling better and by the last half of the race I was feeling pretty good.

Slowly but surely I kept overtaking my 237 pals. One by one I knocked them down on the climbs. I even climbed some hills in my middle chain ring and I still don't know where I got that energy.

Fast forward to the finish. By the time I approached the finish area I had no idea where I would place. I was just pretty sure it wouldn't be LAST. I pushed myself hard on the long flat stretch to the finish as I had passed a 237 fellow a mile or so back who was stuck behind a slower rider. The other 237er looked a lot stronger than me and I just assumed he bonked. However, I knew that when I passed him I'd get his juices flowing and that's exactly what happened. As I rounded the hairpin turn to the finish line I could feel him behind me breathing down my neck. I sprinted to the finish with everything I had. About 50 feet from the finish a tire appeared to my left. I instantly knew I was in trouble. As the course narrowed to the finish line I extended my left elbow out and leaned left to push the attacker into the fence. It didn't work. The attacker blew by me at the last possible second and took a 3rd place finish from me. Now that is what I call fun. I ended the race in 4th and earned my first every medal.

Take care fellow Ranchers and we'll see you at the next race.

Bradford Brown

Keyesville, 2 Bananas & Stretchy Pants?

Hello everyone,

Well, we had a great road trip up past Bakersfield to the 20th annual Keyesville Classic. We had a group of 7 Chicken Ranchers including Dave Lettieri making his first road trip appearance.

We left at 8:00pm Saturday night and stayed at the beautiful Motel 6 in Bakersfield before driving the rest of the way early Sunday morning. The drive up was relatively uneventful, although we did get a good laugh when we snooped through Brad Brown's cooler looking for snacks and we discovered that all he'd packed for the weekend was a bottle of wine and two bananas.......so we ate the bananas.



When we arrived Sunday morning it was clear and cold. In the high 30's or low 40's. The Sport Class raced first which included Dave, Brad Jellison, Robert, Bill, and Gabe. Dave rode well after sleeping all night and driving all day in his brand new compression tights, or as we like to call them......"stretchy pants". He got 2nd. Robert was apparently day dreaming about male triathletes and went off course.....but still managed to finish 5th. Bill and Jelly had an epic battle the whole race with Jelly nipping him at the line to finish 8th with Bill close behind in 9th. Gabriel had an interesting race. After only 2 or 3 miles he had a huge lead on the rest of his field and appeared poised to cruise to an easy victory. But, caught up in the excitement of the moment, he too went off course and ended up having to DQ himself after skipping 3 or 4 miles from the first lap. He was devastated. So we consoled him by making fun of him and cracking jokes at his expense all weekend.........I think he's better now. Brad Brown rode to a "best ever" 4th place in the Beginner Class. Apparently wine works better than I thought it would as a pre-race hydration beverage............or maybe it was not being able to find his bananas that made him faster? Who knows? I continued my unrivaled streak of 2nd place finishes. But I had to earn it by duking it out with Ron Tekada and Bob Nisbet from the Platinum Team. The three of us were never seperated by more than 30 seconds the entire race. I'm not sure if the fact that I like both of those guys made it more fun or more stressful? Actually, just being near Ron made me feel better about myself 'cause last weekend at Bonelli he beat my time by more than 3 minutes!

After the racing was over we were hoping for a quick awards presentation so we could get on the road and get home A.S.A.P. But then we remembered that this was a Mountain Bike Race and there is no such thing as a quick awards presentation. One of the things I've always liked about MTB races is you don't have to pin a number on your jersey, you only put a number plate on your bike. But they changed that this year at the Keyesville Classic. Not only did we have numbers on our jerseys and our bikes....we also had timing chips on our shoes!.........and the results were still all screwed-up. All the technology in the world can't beat the Red-neck system they use at the NORCAL MTB races. They pin a piece of scratch paper to your shoulder with your name and your class on it, and when you come across the line they pull it off and stick-it on the results board in the order you came in.........simple and brilliant. Works every time. Anyways, we decided not to wait for the awards, but since Dave and I were all cleaned up and looking our best in anticipation of getting on the podium. We decided to have our own awards ceremony on a couple of boulders near the car. The guys gave us official "rocks" from the actual Keyesville Classic course and we stood on the boulders side by side with our arms raised in "almost" victory!

On the drive home we were getting desperate for a place to eat and we almost made things worse by stopping at PIZZAVILLE USA which looked like a converted Turkish prison but Bill Cuttler saved us by yelling "Don't make a panic decision!" and he spotted La Mina Mexican restaurant which wasn't bad.......as long as you're not in a hurry.......which we were.

All things considered we had a great time and got home safe. Is it a coincidence that the two highest place finishers on our team were both wearing compression tights the night before the race? I don't know. But I'm not taking any chances. I'm heading down to Fastrack today to get another pair of "stretchy pants" on sale..........and then I'm gonna stop by the liquor store and get a bottle of cheap wine.......and two bananas.


Matt