H2H Series opener, Waywayanda

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So this Sunday was the Campmor H2H series opener, The Waywayanda Spring Cleaning put on by Black Bear Cycling. It was pretty awesome to see everyone again and of course check out what cool new bikes everyone got!! In the Expert field Fisher 29′ers were well represented and Roger Foco won the singlespeed class on a rig!!

With gas prices going up, carpooling is going to be a must this season. Most of my friends who race are Sport riders, so one thing to get used to this season is getting up early, which no one likes to do!! This round I drove up with my boy Prentice. We loaded up the Yaris and were on the road by 7:30. Of course because the Yaris is such a powerful machine with it’s 107 horsepower, that’s right 107, we arrived very much ahead of schedule, we even got to stop at Shop Rite and buy toothpaste!!

When we first got to the park, it was misty and crazy foggy. The fog was so thick you couldn’t see the signs or anything, it was pretty crazy. Hit up registration and grouped up with all our peeps. Chatted it up with some sport guys like fellow High Gear employee Chris Denoma, one of my training buddies Fred Brown, new Fisher 29′er convert Julien aka. Frenchie, and even the infamous Norm of MTBNJ.com.

We cheered for the sport riders and handed off some bottles during their race. Julien and Chris seemed to have pretty good races. We didn’t see the results because we had to warm-up, but I think Julien ended up on the podium. My buddy Fred unfortunately ripped his cleat out of his shoe and ended his race a little early, otherwise he would have been on the podium for sure!

By the time the Expert race came around, the weather made an awesome change!! It just cleared up and got really warm and sunny, it was a miracle!! It seemed like we got a few new guys in our class and the start line looked pretty full, always a good sign, there were probrally close to 30 people in my class. I knew we were going to have fun.

My race went pretty well, I actually got the holeshot and brought the pace up high for the first 1/2 lap and then got passed by a few guys. We caught the 19-29 and singlespeed class before the end of the 1st lap, so going through traffic, the leaders expanded their gap on me. My second lap I got to battle it out with last year’s series winner Chris LeDonne and I eventually dropped him, which boosted my confidence a little bit. Maybe a bit too much, because on a downhill shoot towards the end of the loop I decided to eject myself from my bike into the woods!! Surprisingly, I didn’t lose any spots, at least not right away. Coming into the third lap I was still a little shaken and got popped by Danny Habig. I decided to run defense and not go backwards anymore, my quest for going forward had ended. I just rode tempo the third lap to finish 6th or 7th, they didn’t post results past 5th. Greg Waggoner won, after comparing our race times, we figured he beat me by at least 9 minutes, that guy is FAST!! Maybe pro fast;) I hung around to watch awards and as they called everyone up, I realized that I had passed everyone up there. The 30-39 group had gone through the entire Expert field!! I realized how fast my group is and didn’t feel so bad about not standing on the podium. Great race. Thanks Black Bear Cycling. Thanks Fred for doing bottles. Thanks to Gary for making the illest 29′er on the planet.

Next round is Tymor park in NY. That course suits me well as it has tons of climbing, and I like to climb. So we’ll see if I can get any closer to Mr. Greg. The battle will continue.

-Jim.