Tour de Burg Stage 1

45 miles on the mountain bike and around 5000 ft of climbing means sore legs for the peloton tonight.

I had another mediocre performance and find myself quite often in the back of the finishers. I feel like I was so much faster in past years tours, or maybe these guys just get sooo much faster year in and year out. Probably the latter. First timed section consisted of a big singletrack climb, a little techy moss-rock section (which I walked most of) a little ridge fire road, and then a nice long singletrack drop down off Buck Mountain. A rear flat got me good about half way down, but on the bright side allowed for a nice breather.

Second timed section was a long ridge ride on roll-y singletrack, the kind where you feel there is no place to recover and you're working just as hard to go downhill as you are up.

The big news is I have (temporarily?) relinquished the DFL jersey, but am only 30 seconds off the lead. Like in that big french tour, the pressure of riding with the jersey early on was just too great, and energy sapping so I will look to make my attempt on it in the final days ahead!

BIG road stage in the A.M. lined up close to 80 miles with probably 30 of that gravel...the teeth jarring variety, too. Then at night a MTB-TT on some local trails with the finish at the entrance to the pizza joint!! Woooo, its gonna be killer!

Roll it.