May 24 Race Recap
Tuesday, May 24 kicked off our 2011 season opener, with a kids race at 530pm and then the main event at 6:00pm.
The buzz from previous seasons was bigger than ever with all of our sponsors out, in true BIG form and tons of racers. Back for 2011 is the awesome community of mountain bikers we’ve grown to love. We’ve seen the energy just grow and grow from our initial race. We saw onsite registration top 150 people, and the kids race at 40 entries. Over 40 Sponsors & Exhibitors set up shop in the grass pavilion, and showed their colors, along with tons of teams and our featured shops supporting their riders.
New this year Baja Fresh was out with burritos, quesadillas, chips and soft drinks and Tustin Brewing Company supplied our beer, for the evening festivities.
As a field over or previous record of 425 racers took to the line, there was so much energy among new racers and old that it was tough to keep them held back at the line. After all the onsite registration was set in the system, we launched the first wave of Pro / Expert riders and sent them off at 6:15pm. This year the STRAVA challenge is under way, with a free 3 month entry for the fastest climb on the 1st climb of the day. This week’s fastest climb on that section of the hill was: Nick Stilwell.
A bee hive closed our traditional 1st technical descent of the course and a small piece of single and double track, and made for a faster shorter course than we’ve had before. This cut out approximately a quarter mile of our traditional course, shortening this week’s race to 4.0 miles. That first leg of the course had the pros and experts firing back toward the staging area before we had the 1st wave of beginners off the line, making for some great viewing of the battle upfront for all the newer/beginner and junior racers.
This week we kicked off two new categories. Single Speed (for now a combined women/men category) and Men’s Super Sport. Men’s Super Sport is a middle class between the Sport winners of the past and the Expert 4 lap length. Both proved to be full of excitement, and many Single Speeders turned out for the excitement, in a previously void field. Men’s Super Sport top 3 this week were: Jeremiah Smith with Fullerton Bikes, Moises Molina, Alex Suchey with team GearCyclewear.com. Single Speed by F&M Bank top 3 finishers were Heith Masters ,WIN-TEAM RACING, Eric Williams, Team Thunderbolt and DONALD JACKSON SDG/FELT FACTORY TEAM. You can see the rest of the race results here. https://raceoc.com/race-results/may-24-2011-race-results-adults/
As the course wound around there was lots to see a forty foot boat built on a truck in the backlot from an event running this weekend, lanterns along the main back climb, and total eco-system change from our lake departure, the desert of the back 1st climb, and the Florida style marshlands that developed during the race preride. As riders took to the last section of what’s typically a single track section, it became the CycloCross center of Over the Hump. As it received more traffic, racers pressed the dirt down and water rose to the surface (interestingly we’d ridden it multiple times, without having to dismount the weeks prior), the intense traffic of Over the Hump, was more than the buried mud could endure. It rose to the top, becoming peoples favorite or least favorite part of the course for the night.
The finish was no less exciting as racers came into their final 2, 3 or 4 laps, they crossed the start finish banner looking into the descending sun, and collected their finish. The fun just begun there was another hour of people sharing stories and enjoying a tasty burrito or sipping a nice chilly draft.
With every race, we’re excited to see new racers to the scene and acknowledge the veteran’s accomplishments. We can’t wait to see the season progress and thank each of you for making Over the Hump, the most amazing place to race in Southern California. We love the Tuesday break from the week, it’s like having a 2nd weekend.
Tuesday night was a whopper – tons of fun! See you next week.
2 Comments
Super fun race! Me and my kids raced on Tue. 5/24/2011 it was are 1st time ever doing a MTB race. I just wanted to say I love MTBing and especially with my family. However, I think this will be our last race of this summer because I can’t afford spending $100 a week on going to a race. Please consider making this more affordable for families.
Matt, all good points. We do let kids race free, if both parents are racing. We’ll extend that to juniors too; however we do have considerable hard-costs involved in racing.
We’d love for you to keep racing, because you are having fun! Drop us a line directly on how many people are racing, in your family. Matt@overthehumpseries.com thanks for the feedback.