to sum it up... "wow!" So this was my first race, and I was excited because I was very familiar with the trails the course was on and I really didn't have any expectations but to start the race and to finish it with only a few scrapes, and have a great time in the process. Mission accomplished. I rode the course saturday evening with a buddy and it was in great shape and fairly fast besides a few normal bogs. There was only one sketchy rock that took a few tries to hit the best line to ride up and over it with ease, but other than that, i felt good about trying to ride it as fast as possible the next day. Then the inevitable happened.. the gods decided it would be fun to drop almost 2" of rain throughout the night on the area. Sunday ended up to be a beautiful day, but the damage was done! This was gonna be a mud-fest! I registered for the beginner class, so I only had one lap to do. Sport class has 2 laps, expert had 3. Some of the expert class racers were more than happy to be done after their second lap because of the tiring conditions, but still nothing but smiles out of everyone. After party back at the bike shop included stacks of sirianis pizza and a keg from the brewpub. Already lookin' fwd to the 'revenge of the rattlesnake' race in sept!
photog pics from near the start/finish area don't really show what the course was like once you left the open field, but you can get an idea by some of the mud covered faces
race pics 
