Day 7 and 8

We are starting to get giddy and having difficulty sleeping on the hard ground. At 2 am Trevor got up to pee and returned to the tent accidentally waking Stuart up. Trevor immediately slapped on his eye shade and stuffed in his ear plugs and went back to sleep Stuart took the opportunity to get up and pee also so as he very sleepily got out of his sleeping bag he set it up so it would be easy to get back into it in the dark and with eyes closed. Stuart returned to the tent and began to climb in the sleeping bag but cold not figure out where the opening was. Wrong tent? No everything else was familiar. Then Trevor started to snort and shake and then broke out in histerics. He had flipped the bag around after Stuart left the tent. We ended up both having the biggest belly laugh ever. At 2 am our neighbors probably wanted to kill us and I wanted to kill Trevor.
So day 7 proved to be quite punishing after all but exhilarating at the same time. The race followed trails in and around Whistler that were created by a legendary builder who is known for linking , flowy, technical and demanding trails.
The gun went off and we immediately started gaining elevation at an alarming rate climbing 700 m in the first 10 km. It is amazing that the body recovers to a point it can support our weight never mind climb a mountain after 6 days of racing.
We pleasantly found our selves riding with the second and third place womens team most of the day and groups who would normally be ahead of us in previous days which kept us motivated. Even more motivating was Team 204, one of our category rivals, passed us at the 12 km mark of the 47 km course They had been moving up the field and we were the next on their list They had made 11 mins on us the day before to put them within 11 mins of taking our place away. We held onto them and jockied most of the day but they ended up getting away from us in the last 10 km. Despite our efforts, we felt we were ok to let them go, as it would take a flat or break down for them to make up 11 min in 10 km. They had a great race but were only able to make 5 mins on us.
Team Winded was 12/46 on the day and 16/46 for the entire race
It is interesting to observe the differences in riding styles between the top women and grunts like us. What the women lack in upper body strength and risk taking they make up in finesse. Men tend to muscle their way through and willing to ride the skinny or launch down drops Gorillas compared to Gazelles, consequently there were more impact injuries to men than women from bouncing off trees or falling off bridges.

Another amazing story was a racer on a team from Mexico bike broke in half on one of the descents near the end. They wanted to finish so badly so they strapped the parts to their back and hiked across the finish line.

We had a great wrap up party at the round house at the top of Whistler, said our thank yous and good byes to the many amazing people we met and had a great night sleep at the Westin. We are now packing and getting ready for the ride back to the Airport for our 4 pm flight back home

Pain is temporary, quiting is forever.... Lance Armstrong

Thumbed from my BlackBerry® wireless device