Posted by Ron Prinzlau On Juni 06, 20140 Comment
Translated by Bjørn Henschke
It was time again. Time again, for a race in the Harz. In Altenau. Long and ambitious. As planned 124km,the long distance.
Because I wasn´t able to sleep the night before, I just thought about riding fully or hardtail. I took both bikes with me, thank you founder of the SUV.
For the Pirate gils Julia and Suse, I´m just a hero, because I just registere myself for the long distance. Such words and looks, just before the start makes you feel wonderful, stronger and un-vulnerable. Than, Jukia wanted some hints from me, an old race mule. It was getting better and better. There she stood in front of me, so cute, soft vulnerable and with her hard tail and asked me, as an old guy with race experience I should have told her not to start because it´s to dangerous. I still hear me saying, Julia after one round on the roots, everything will hurt.
For a short moment I thought about riding the heavy and pussy bike, fully or the hero bike, the hard tail.
I should have listen to Julia, or to my princess at home and stayed at home and so I decided to ride the pussy fully. If you´re that old like me, you will forget a lot. I forget about the things after each race I rode with my fully, that I cursed it or destroyed it during the race, like in TrengaDE, Sylzhain or, well, all the memories, the pictures or even Altenau. Yes, Altenau in 2012 in 6:35 over 119km.
Everything forgotten. Thanks the lord, that you got, as a long distance rider the memory of a mayfly…
All right, enough of wining, here the facts of my DNF…
My pulse was higher than 140 beats per minute. But I still was able to greet some friends of mine, who rode the short distance. Than the start, after 50m some of the guys ahead fought very hard for some place, like this would be the home straight sprint and not a 214km race. My brakes blocked and I crashed into the others. Nothing happened, luckily and I was able to ride on after some time. On the downhill parts the fully was good, but on the uphill section, it felt like someone would hold me from behind, and so I moved on with the speed of a snail. My time for the first round was not bad, but more than 15 min slower than with my hardtail during my exercise round. And so, things getting started…without any remark of me…
I became slower and the split time by the organizer for the first 2 rounds were 4:30h, a really fast time. But I didn´t know about anything and so I rode on, until a friend came up from behind and told me, if we should push the throttle right know, we would be able to be on time. Than I get to know the danger about a DNF. My muscles didn´t want anymore but my head, the fully was heavy and after 4:50h everything was over and out. Lots of guys, AG´s had to get out of the race. No ranking after 85km and this for 40€ starting money. Just the elite and the podiums guys made the split. I laid until this point on 28th overall and 6th in my AG, because not much guys wanted to ride the long distance. But it would be nice, to ride this race until the finish. My dear Harz, I like you, but I don´t see any future for us on the long distance. I promised it Julia. Luckily I was being comfort by Julia and Suse. For them I was still a hero, even with a DNF
We will see us – Willingen; P-Way,
on the long distance J (Sorry Julia)
André
