The legs are recovering and the mind is starting to make sense of the High Cascades hundie this past weekend.
All in all, it was a great event with an awesome course. The course is generally pretty fast as the uber fast guys were coming in sub 8 hrs! The singlespeed winner came in sub 9 hours! The singlespeed category as a whole was fast. To take that thought a step further, I was the 23rd out of 27 singlespeeders to cross the line and 153rd overall out of 320 (if you count the DNF's). So overall I was solid mid-pack, but as a singlespeeder I was on the back end.
Gear Ratio - I ran a 32:20 for the race and the legs felt fine throughout the day. I am thinking a 32:19 is probably a good ratio for the race as you won't be quite as spun out on some sections and none of the climbs were too steep, and the steep ones were hike a bike regardless of gear ratio (unless of course you are not a mortal).
The body hurt more after this race than it has after any other hundie or enduro event. For some reason, this course beats you up! There is less climbing than other hundies which for me translated into the legs feeling OK, but the body feeling like it had been put through a meat grinder. I think it is because you are on singletrack for most of the race and the middle 30 or so miles are technical rocky sections that just beat you into submission with all the lava rock. The hardtail selection of bike just exacerbated the pain the last 30 miles.
Tires - I was glad I swapped out tires prior to the race and went with re-enforced sidewalls. I still cringed as I went through the long tech sections that kept popping my tires as I went through it. Running tubeless is definitely the way to go.
Mudslinger did a bang up job on organization and clean up post-race. Those guys have this dialed in.
All in all, it was a great event with an awesome course. The course is generally pretty fast as the uber fast guys were coming in sub 8 hrs! The singlespeed winner came in sub 9 hours! The singlespeed category as a whole was fast. To take that thought a step further, I was the 23rd out of 27 singlespeeders to cross the line and 153rd overall out of 320 (if you count the DNF's). So overall I was solid mid-pack, but as a singlespeeder I was on the back end.
Gear Ratio - I ran a 32:20 for the race and the legs felt fine throughout the day. I am thinking a 32:19 is probably a good ratio for the race as you won't be quite as spun out on some sections and none of the climbs were too steep, and the steep ones were hike a bike regardless of gear ratio (unless of course you are not a mortal).
The body hurt more after this race than it has after any other hundie or enduro event. For some reason, this course beats you up! There is less climbing than other hundies which for me translated into the legs feeling OK, but the body feeling like it had been put through a meat grinder. I think it is because you are on singletrack for most of the race and the middle 30 or so miles are technical rocky sections that just beat you into submission with all the lava rock. The hardtail selection of bike just exacerbated the pain the last 30 miles.
Tires - I was glad I swapped out tires prior to the race and went with re-enforced sidewalls. I still cringed as I went through the long tech sections that kept popping my tires as I went through it. Running tubeless is definitely the way to go.
Mudslinger did a bang up job on organization and clean up post-race. Those guys have this dialed in.
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