Stoney 1/2 Marathon report

Yeah I know this was supposed to be a marathon race but oh well I guess 30 miles is better than nothing. The weather was nice for the start of the race about 67 degrees and not a breath of wind. DC and I were talking about some strategy...he wanted to go fast out of the gate and see who could hold on...he eventually wanted to catch up with the Elite guys and ride with them. For anyone who has never done the Stoney Marathon the start is a gradual climb which opens up to a shorter steeper climb then eventually feeds into some singletrack. Don was gone off of the start. I was in second with Keith Reige behind me. I was trying to hold on but I soon realized that if I rode that pace the whole race I'd be fried. So I decided to back it down, Keith went past me and we kind of rode like that for a while until Keith and Tim Collins got away on the crest of this climb midway through the 1 st lap and started working together. I eventually caught a younger guy who started ahead of me and we were making up some ground. The only thing was that this guy was stronger than me in the 2 track but he held me up huge in the woods. At one point I had almost got back to Keith (maybe 10 yards) but then he wicked it up on the the 2 track and I couldn't keep up. I really do think there is something about a 29er on the flats he could definately accelerate quickly. Well I decided to back it down a little and the young guy caught up with me again. We worked well together and midway through the single track on lap 3 I got around him and gapped him good. I had just gotten onto to the 2 track that would eventually lead back to the start finish area when I noticed my rear wheel was going flat. You know the feeling you get..the back end gets squirelly and although you hope it is something else you know U R screwed. I stopped and looked at my sidewall which had a nice gash in it. I knew I had a spare tube in the car...I woulda carried one but I lost my 3rd inflator in two weeks the other day and I still hadn't bought a new one so what's the use in carrying a tube. Oh well after a walk to the car I thought about fixing it but I noticed my kids were running over to me...Oh well Marathon done. The best thing was that I got to push Jenna around for her first kids race. All the kids got a medal...It was cool definately the highlight of the day. She was so proud of herself. DC who was watching (he dnf'd after 2 laps because a stick found its way into his new Mavic SLR wheelset and tore out 4 spokes) said we coulda won if I would have pushed faster. Oh well all in all not a bad day. I would have like to have finished but that just wasn't going to happen and I got to push my daughter around on her first race. Pics to follow...TC