Prattsburgh Rambler

This post was written by Jason Hilimire on April 26, 2009

Just finished up one of my favorite races of the season. The Ramble Around Prattsburgh. A super fun, 30 mile dirt road race. Some good climbs and some good fast descents.

Happy with my 3rd place finish overall. 30 miles is a little on the short end for myself being as I’m more focused on the 100 mile/enduro mtb stuff.

We had a single rider dangling off the front and I gave chase with a small group attempting to bridge. It’s not too often that a race shatters on a descent, but with all of us in the front group on cross bikes it was bound to happen.

Check me out ripping the descent on my cross bike

Was able to bridge up after the descent and we became a front group of 3 riders. Working together a bit on the long and windy Hungry Hollow climb, I got shelled on one of the accelerations and knew that there was a massive wall at the end of the climb and I could try to rebridge on the descent.

The re-bridge never quite came. I gave massive chase on the ensuing descents and kept the front 2 riders in check as they had a just shy of a minute gap as we moved out onto the windswept roads and through the very sandy potato farm fields. I was hoping to close the gap by the time we hit the singletrack and the mud chute as I knew if I got there on wheels, I could create a gap. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be, the blasting wind and the efforts of the day had me digging deep to pay the pain toll.

I actually lost time in the singletrack and last few miles. Was very happy though with my 3rd place finish. Thinking I might take this weekend off and put in some good training on the mountain bike in preparation for the Mohican 100 and Lumberjack 100 coming up quick!

(somebody please share with me how to embed non-youtube videos, Why can I embed on my personal site, but not here on TWT?)