Bike and Brew Race Report
6/2-3
Todd Morse Tucker
Hey all, I did the Bike and Brews race over in Leavenworth this past weekend and it was pretty frickin awesome. For those that have not done this race before the course is basically a circuit that is a bunch of climbing all at once (1600′) followed by a rippin fast decent. You do this 3 times. Nothing about it is very technical but the decent is very fast and has some water bar/speed bump/jumps in it that scare the crap out of me.
Right from the start the race split up and a group with, Todd Davis and Anthony Dickson of the Audi Team , a Jacks bicycle shop rider and myself getting a big gap on the rest of the field. I felt really good climbing and was the first guy from my group over the top on the first lap. I had maybe a 30 second gap to the other guys when I started my first decent. Dickson and the Jacks guy caught me about half way down the decent and stayed behind me until about a quarter of the way up the climb on the second lap. Those guys where really pushing the pace and I couldn’t hang for the fear that I would just absolutely explode. I thought I had lots of time on on Todd Davis at the top of the climb but he caught me about 3/4 of the way down the decent. That had me worried because I knew that meant I had to put Lots of time between us on the final lap to hold him off on the downhill. I kept pushing hard on the final climb and had folks on the course telling me Jacks guy only had 30 seconds on me. At the half way point of the climb Mr. Jacks broke his chain and that basically gifted me a podium spot. I was able to descend well enough on the final lap to hold on to second position and finish with a time of 2hr 5min. 2.5 minutes behind Anthony Dickson who just slayed that course.
I was fairly pleased with my race but that is the 3rd time I have been runner-up there so that is a bit of a bitter pill. That is one of the races I would really like to win. It’s good to be on the MTB again. Next week I’m racing it again at the Echo Valley 60 miler.
Cheers, TMT