Let the Past Be Past

Our mountain bike racing scene has pretty much been non existant since Summer. It really is a shame. I only hope that the consequences are dealt with with open minds next year. It's been just a few short years since everyone complained about how they wanted more opportunities to race... Fast forward a couple of years and those same people are scarce to find race day. There is to be much change on the horizon in order to make our scene even remotely worth investing in promoting wise. When a promoter busts their ass off to offer us an oppoturnity to unite and race our bikes in the woods, they should be at least fortunate enough to have enough people show to make it worth it. Having less than a hundred racers used to be a joke... Now it's common.

I really hate to be a negative Nancy, but I want to see our scene grow as much as anyone else. Mountain bike racing to me is my passion. It's my escape, my time to dig deeper than I can dig anytime else. You can't truely find out how far you can go, how fast, how hard, until you step up to the line and race a group of equal riders. That's when you truely find out what your made of. It's the stories afterwards. The excitement on a racers face as they describe an epic battle they had fighting for 3rd place. It's the exhuastion on their face when they cross the line, and that faint smile the appears when they cross the line. I love XC racing. It's so much more different than endurance racing. Their both great, but my beloved XC scene has crumbled around me the last few years. I have no one to race against my age... That's a major problem in my book.

There are so many other issues that we must overcome to be anything like the other series around the country. I've been very fortunate to race all over the states this year, and I'm sad to say our scene is by far the worst off attendence wise. There are some series that have more racers in the begginer class than we do our whole race.

I hope to be more involved when I move to KC. I have a head full of ideas and the energy of being young on my side. I don't want to be like everyone else, and move elsewhere to find my fix. Of course I could move to a better race scene area to persue my dreams, but this is my home, and damnit I like it.

On a slightly better note, I'm more than excited to be able to head down to Council Bluffs and participate in Burnin this weekend. If you don't know what I'm talking about then you don't know jack. Burnin has been on my hit list for way too long now. The stories have always been interesting, but I can promise you this year will be as crazy as ever. I'm going to party and race like a rockstar. I'm also pretty lucky to have a pretty bad ass 3 man team. It's going to be a throwdown...

If your riding cross more than once a week right now then I'm extremely sorry. It's another wonderful Fall and trails won't stay so perfect forever....

G