Indie Race #2 @ South Seatac Park

The weather had been showing another dreary day for the 2nd race in the Indie Series.  The newly named 'Tucker Classic'.  Just so you know...Tucker was Wicks dog.  Wick is the promoter for this race and also a huge part of the Seattle cycling scene.  Tucker was a golden lab who just loved everyone and spent a lot of time hanging out with Wick at South Seatac.  Tucker passed this last winter and he will be missed.  So I'm glad we are able to commemorate this great friend and companion with a super race.  Well, I put all my gear together on Saturday night with just about every option for any weather conditions but had heavily leaned towards cold and wet.  I woke up fairly early on Sunday even though my race wasn't till 3pm and went straight to my office and cruised around on the Internet when Molly woke and said...have you looked outside....It's beautiful!...WHAT!  I look outside thinking she's messing with me and have to quickly pull out short finger gloves to add to the collection.  We head out of the house around 9:30 so we can get to the race to pre-ride and support the mens sport racers on our team.  I walk around in the warm sun and B.S. with my friends, then take pictures of the mens sport race.  I watch some of the women's race then get suited up and jump on the course, making sure I don't get in the way of any of the ladies who are racing.  I do eventually catch a few of the women and cruise along behind them until the course is wide enough that I can shoot by and not let them draft.  Wow, the course is really cool in it's layout and almost completely dry...buff actually.  The loop is 4 3/4 miles long.  When we gather for the start we find out that we'll be doing 6 1/2 laps.  Oh crap, that's 31 miles.  This will be the longest XC race I've ever done.  This is going to hurt as the course is super fast and there isn't any place to rest.  Gonna be full on for over 2 hours.  The race starts on the road and after about 100 yards it turns into singletrack.  Everything grinds to a halt as we filter 1 by 1 into the narrow trail.  Once we are in there we crank it up.  I hang in to the pack for the first couple laps but the pace is just too high.  I need to start racing my own race.  I get passed by a few people but as the race goes on I start catching people who are blowing up and cramping.  I'm on the verge myself but I control it.  Things are going well and I'm feeling good with how I'm rolling thru the twisty course.  As I start lap 6 I notice a bit of control loss and I look down and realize my front tire is really low.  Damn these specialized tubeless tires!  I've had nothing but trouble with them.  I've done everything correctly with the prep and use of Specialized own sealant but they just leak and leak.  Sometimes I can get it to stop by spending hours shaking the tires and slowly spinning them while on their side but AGAIN they are failing at the wrong time.  They are super low weight but they blow air through the sidewalls like crazy.  It seems to be the Sauserwinds only and in talking to others they have experienced the same thing.  Back to tubes on these tires and time to start looking for tires from someone else that are fairly light but will hold air and work in our multiple conditions ranging from water, mud, paste, buff to powder dry.  Well, back to the race.  I'm now trying to decide whether I want to stop and pump air into the tire or just keep going and hope I don't have an issue with it rolling. off the rim.  I choose the latter and go very slowly around every corner and turn but hammer on the straight aways.  I finish up the last lap and no one has caught me so I'm only irritated instead of pissed.  The PBR offered to me post race makes me forget the problems and I get cleaned up and put everything away.  Chat again with some folks and then just as we get in the car it starts to drizzle.  Perfect timing.  As we drive home, we drive into a clearing and unloading the bikes and gear yields not a single drop of rain.  Great Day!  I'm finding out quickly that the expert racers in the indie series are much more capable than those who race in Budu.  I had a great race and felt good but still got my butt kicked.  Good times!