It was early February when I registered to race in the 1999 Sea Otter Classic.
I talked it over with my wife, Michele, and we decided that it would be fun to
invite her mother to come with us. The plan was to go to Monterey on Saturday
and check into our favorite motel. We would viist Carmel that afternoon and
bright and early Sunday morning, I would go off to the race while the ladies
slept in. We would meet Sunday afternoon on the beach at Carmel River and head
for home. Great plan, but her Mom wouldn't buy into it.

We ultimately decided to save our money for a cross country ski trip later in
the spring by driving over on Sunday morning. I started off by checking my
biorythm chart and was dismayed to note that all three phases were below the
line on race day. All this means is that I would not be able to perform well
on a physical level, I wouldn't be able to understand why, but I would be
grumpy about it.

A few days before the race, I started checking sattelite maps and doppler
radar images. Wave upon wave of rain and showers kept coming ashore and I
expected to find the entire course under water. The forecast was for showers
on Saturday, clearing on Sunday. You can imagine how I felt when I found that
it was raining when I got up Sunday morning.

We left for Laguna Seca Raceway at 6:00 a.m. and I had decided that I would
drop out of the race if it was actively raining or the reports were that the
course was a 16 mile long mud bog. I was please to note that the weather 
cleared about 30 miles into our 90 mile trek. Upon our arrival, I talked with 
an old boy at check-in who had done a pre-ride the day before, and said that 
although there were a few mud bogs, over all, it was pretty nice.

My wave took off at 9:23 a.m. and I had high hopes of breaking the three hour
barrier this year. I had told my son, who now lives in Colorado that if I
couldn't do it, I wouldn't be back in 2000. I realized about a mile and a half 
into the race that I wasn't being passed by wave after wave of riders that 
started behind me as in previous years. Don't get me wrong, I was being 
passed, and passed a lot, but there were always riders behind me, and I was 
never really alone.

At about the three mile mark I encountered a man walking back with his bike in 
one hand and his front wheel in the other. It seems that he had a new tube 
with him, but no pump. He didn't seem to interested in changing mine over from 
Schraeder to Presta, so I let him have a CO2 cartridge. Less than a half mile 
later, there was a kid trying to get his tire off and expressed an interest in
using my levers. I packed up and left when he had his tire off, figuring I
hadn't lost more that about ten minutes during the two stops.

Things went pretty uneventfully after that. I had to walk a few of the climbs,
cooked down the fire road, and finally arrived at the MAJOR DROPOFF !

The hilltop was lined with ghouls and ambulance chasers, all ringing bells and
shouting "No brakes ! No brakes !". I called to them and let them know that I,
for one, was not going to do anything spectacular. Negotiating the drop from
behind the seat, bouncing through pot holes that were capable of swallowing
at least one third of a wheel, I ended up on a little smooth spot on the left
side of the trail next to a large, low rock. I came to a stop to catch my
breath about two feet above the trail itself, and found that my right shoe
didn't want to release from the pedal. In slow motion, my bike and I keeled
over onto the trail. It wasn't really what you could call spectacular, but
I got a few chuckles out of the crowd and lots more shouting and ringing of
bells when I remounted and continued my descent.

I stopped at the water station at the half way mark for a lunch of a gel
packet and water. After a nature call (at least I was keeping hydrated) and
refilling my Camel Back, I was off and pedalling again, 1 hour 26 minutes
into the race. More climbing, more spectacular single track. Plenty of rocks
and boulders waiting for a rider to lose concentration. A winding downhill
single track section that passed by an erosion rut 18 inches wide and THREE
FEET DEEP. Definitely not the place to lose control. What a ride.

By then, the crowd of people behind me had thinned out considerably. I'd only
get passed about every 10 minutes or so. I managed to pass a couple of people
along there, including the girl I had ridden with in the first two races. We
met up again on "The Climb Home" and swapped back and forth for some time. She
got by me on "The Corkscrew" when we got back on the track, and I got by her
on the last downhill run. She passed me again on a flat land mud bog and kept
shouting at me that I only had 9 minutes to break 3 hours. Then she was gone.

I reached the finish line at 2:59:20 ! Unfortunately, they were staging the 
Pro's and wouldn't let me ride across. I guess it wouldn't do to have some
tired, old, mud encrusted beginner ride past all those clean, fresh, brightly
colored spandex clad guys on their $3000+ bikes. If I sound bitter, it's a
passing thing. As long as they got my time right, I'll deal with it. I wasn't
there for the cheers. I was there for myself, and for a personal best. The
official results placed me 80th out of 89 starters and 80 finishers. As I 
promised last year, I finished dead last, but I finished. I even came in with
a better time than some of the younger beginner men. According to my 
calculations, I was 799th out of 803 (923 if you count the DNFs).

The best part of the day was being found by my wife who administered a big
victory kiss followed by a big victory hug. The second best part of the day
was the unwinding on the beach with a beer, Michele and the crashing surf and
all the while, considering the '00 Otter and a 2:45 E.T. finish. See you
there.