Race Angel Fire Race Report – Garrett Gerchar

Race Angel Fire Race Report – Garrett Gerchar

I arrived at Angel Fire Resort Midday Friday pre rode the course with Nevin, another Tokyo Joe’s rider, which we both enjoyed. After pre riding, I relaxed, and kept my feet up till dinner where I had pasta with salmon. Slept till 10:00 so plenty of sleep before a big race. When I woke up I got a breakfast of eggs, bacon, some cereal, orange juice, and some strawberries. I relaxed till about an hour before the race then I started to warm up with Curtis, Wyatt, Chris, and Nevin.

Our warm-up included a 30 minute easy spin, then a two minute hard effort with a two minute easy spin, a 30 second hard effort with another two minute spin, then another 10 second sprint with another two minute spin to the start line, which I showed up a little late to but still got a good starting position.

My start was good but lost a couple positions on the start loop because I didn’t want to blow up before the climb. On the first lap I took it easy, and thanks to my 1×10 setup I passed both Curtis and Joe putting me in second place. For the rest of the climb I kept the first place rider in my sights. Then on the decent I caught up to the first place rider. On one section of the decent I burped my tire. Tried to ride it but it was really low so on the begging of the climb I had to stop and fill up my tire. It was my first time using a CO2, so I hoped I got it right and luckily I did.

I continued the climb, but unfortunately I had lost sight of the first place rider. I kept trying to catch him but unfortunately I had to stop again right before the decent to fill my tire up again. Then on the final decent I put in everything I had into trying to catch the first place rider, but I couldn’t catch him so I ended up 2 minutes and 21 seconds behind him. I think that if I didn’t need to stop to fill my tire up twice I had a really good chance of catching the leader. Overall it was a very good race, and I liked the course a lot even with all the ruts.
Report by Jack