Washington Park

Washington Park was an awesome course. Alot of speed and hill climb sections with fun cornering in a nice long loop. I loved the twin coffin bunny hop section...no flames to leap through this year. There was only mud at the start through the grass so they started us on top of the hill and made us ride through a 5 foot wide section.

My start was OK and watched Ben Popper go off the front and establish a tempo. It took a lap for things to settle in and thin out and by then Tristian was well up on his own and James Lalonde was making some progress getting on Ben's wheel. I started to pick my way through riders and then I settled in with Kyle and Tim Pacholski for pretty much the entire race. Tim and I traded alot of pulls and Kyle was there every time on his 29er, a great choice for this course. I could tell he was catching up to me on the off camber downhill sections and was able to keep it close on the run up.

There was an offcamber corner before the hill run up that I would always take slowly and I yet still crashed and Tim road off. I have to thank Kyle since he brought me back up to Tim's wheel with a lap to go. I knew it would come down to a sprint and felt I would have better acceleration versus Kyle on his mountain bike but Tim has been riding pretty strong.

On the in your face wind section on the concrete portion of the course, Tim sprinted but it felt like a lead out; no problem staying on his wheel then 20 yards before the turn I winded up my sprint and took 3rd overall.

Alot of fast people here today so I felt good about my result. Alot of hard work into the wind and up and down some hills.