Start/Finish arch at the Circuito de San José
Jeff doing warm-up laps behind #1, the eventual destroyer of the field
The Cafayate crew (plus some guy and his dogs) back in town after the race
After the bike race in Cafayate, I got invited to participate in another in Santa Maria. I didn’t know what I was in for.
I had offered to drive some racers from Cafayate up to the race. We rigged up a trailer to carry our bikes and were off. I generally hate driving with a trailer, but it was by far the best way to go with 6 people in our 5 person car.
When we arrived, it was clear this race was of a different class. There were true cyclists here. By that I mean people whose bikes were multiples more expensive than their cars. We saw beat up 1980s trucks with $10k imported Cannondales on them. Probably 25% of the riders were warming up on trainers. Several teams were represented. Lots of guys were wearing skinsuits. I was soon told that Santa Maria is known to have the best cyclists in the country, and that several riders that had represented Argentina in the recent Panamerican Championship would be competing. Yikes. This race was legit.
The course was cross-country style, which around here means narrow trails and a lot of sand. I’m not a bad technical mountain biker, but I’m a bit timid. My first pre-ride of the 3km course revealed a super sketchy descent on the back side. It was about a foot wide, carved into the side of a steep hill, which meant that if you hit your inside pedal, you were going down the hillside.
I was again racing in the ‘Elite’ category, and we were scheduled to ride 6 laps of the course. From the gun, the Panamerican representatives attacked. The group shattered almost immediately, and I was over threshold within 2 minutes of the start. Our first time down the sketchy descent, two guys in front of me and one in back crashed down the hillside. That was it for my race. I was totally freaked out for the next couple of laps. I stopped often to let faster, fearless racers pass, and was able to calm myself down and ride mostly alone, trying to simply enjoy my ride (since I was no longer really racing). The fastest racers lapped me at the end of lap 2 of 6. They were FLYING. It was incredible to see. By my fourth lap, I was settled in and riding the descent with confidence. It was just in time to see the winner finish. I had lost right around 2 laps in an hour of racing. The winner (a Panamerican representative), appropriately assigned the #1 bib, absolutely destroyed the field, winning by several minutes.
Yeah, I got dusted, but I had a great time in the process. Lots of guys pulled themselves from the race after they got lapped, which for most of us was within the first 20 minutes of racing. I thought, “no way I drove an hour and a half to ride 20 minutes”. Afterward, we packed the bikes back on the trailer, and I got to give an interview to a local TV network! Being the only foreigner that ever shows up to these races has apparently given me mild fame in the local cycling community.
It was again great fun, and I’m glad I got to experience a top-level cross country mountain bike race!
