24 Hours in Oz
Cory Wallace / 18.10.2010
The days leading up to the 24 hr Worlds were pretty gongshowish as my buddy Jeff Collins (Kiwi) and I ran around Canberra picking up food etc. for the race and setting up our Pit area out at race site. Prepping for a 24 hourr race is a challenge in Canada, and that's when we are able to load my truck with everything including a kitchen sink and drive just 3 hours to Canmore for the race. Making this happen half way around the World is another story. We had some help from the other Canadians down here, our home stay (Darro Stinson), and big help from the Kona boys who showed up with tents and mechanics.
Race day:
11:45 am – Le Mans start! I go from front row to a mid pack position over a 300 m run!
11:47am - On the bike, the legs feel unreal and I ride up to the lead group, look at the boys and then hammer away up the hill.
I was pretty nervous heading into the race as I had never been in a field of 400 riders and most of the Aussies seemed pretty serious. I figured the best way to deal with the emotions was to go on the offensive. This worked for the first 5 laps as the chase pack of 7 riders began to blow up one by one.
The British national champ and a few of the top Australian's bit on my attack and blew themselves up and essentially out of the race. The only problem was the defending champion, Jason English was one step ahead of me and hung back, not pitting at all, eventually catching me on the 6th lap still with good legs. Over the next few laps he would take 3 minutes out of me a lap and soon had a 20 minute lead.
I was riding hard but at the same time a little pre-occupied with all the crazy animals hopping around the course. One lap I came barrelling around a corner into a posse of 7 kangaroos, I almost wet my pants as I skidded out of control towards them. A little later I apparently just missed running over a black snake which slid out of the way just in time and then lunged at the British rider behind me. I was in zombie mode at the time and didn't know anything had happened until talking to the Brit after the race. There was also a time in the night where a baby kangaroo leapt onto the course just feet ahead of me and then back into the woods. Lucky little bastard as I was riding my bike like a drunk by that time and didn't have the reaction time to miss him!
Going into the night things were rolling smoothly with Jeff keeping things together in the pit and the legs still pushing over. On lap 13 the gongshows began as I double flatted, had co2's blow up, ran out of tubes etc ... 20 minutes later I got air back in my tires and made it back to pit row where I was now sitting in 4th position.
SleepMonsters
