12 Hours of SoCal (Temecula)

Josh & Brad at the start

Josh and I teamed up again for the second of three races in the 12 Hours of SoCal (formerly known as 12 Hrs of Temecula) Series. Our teammates Brad and Todd also paired up again for the race. As expected, it was a HOT day in the SoCal desert so Josh and I really had to watch ourselves. It was already warm when the race started at 9am so we knew it only going to get worse. We did everything we could to cool off in between laps including soaking our gloves and jerseys in the ice chest!

Although we both raced The Traverse the weekend before, we allowed ourselves some recovery time through the week so we felt pretty good in Temecula. Even so, we still each had our moments of despair, but we battled through them and persevered.

We were able to finish stronger than most and got the WIN in the Pro Co-ed Two Person and 2nd PLACE OVERALL Two Man Teams behind our very own Sho-Air teammates Brad & Todd!

Once again the race director Jason and his staff did an outstanding job of organizing the race. They changed up the course and added a little more fun, technical singletrack and I thought it was the funnest course yet!

2nd Place Marius & Mandy, RD Jason, 1st Place Bern & Josh

The Traverse

From my point of view it was climb, climb, climb for 5 hours then 1 hour down and out to the finish. 46 Miles and 8,000+ feet of elevation gain!

After 2 hours: This is where I looked back and said, "Dang, I already rode that far and I'm still feeling pretty good!" (Ingest hammer gel, relax on the Ergons, and keep climbing)

After 4 hours: This is when I looked ahead and said, "Dang, I still have that far to go and I don't feel very well." (Stop, hop off the bike, pour a zip lock of powdered Heed in my mouth, and unwillingly proceed)

After 5.5 hours: No more climbing!

But concentrate on the downhill or else...

Where's the end of this downhill?

Yay! The finish line in 6 hours 2 minutes! (Ingest the time keepers' 4 mini chocolate doughnuts and Lay's BBQ potato chips so I won't bonk on the way to the party)

Louise Kobin, Ankie Trollegard, and Bern on the podium with a little cash payout!

Manny and Jason were incredible! 1st and 2nd in under 4 hours!

Josh rode down the entire Trabuco trail and out the fire road on his rim! Crazy nut still finished in under 5 hours!

Super Mario on the podium again!

"Big checks" for Lou and Bern so we immediately went shopping! I'm not kidding, before we got home from the race, we were trying on pretty dresses!

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