Upon my arrival at Jason’s, Jeff and Ashley were leaving.  I was a little disappointed by that, I figured they would stay a while longer, but apparently they both had an early day that day.  Sometimes I’m not sure I am getting the truth though.  It seems like Jeff has more excuses when he is with Ashley.  It like she doesn’t fit in all that well with Jeff and his friends and because of that, she is only open (acts herself) with Jeff when others aren’t around.  So to get time when she is herself, Jeff and her need to leave earlier than normal from outings so they have some time together by themselves.  Like I said, this isn’t a definite, I’m just speculating here.  If that is the case though, I hope that Ashley can work up to being herself when others are around.  Especially because they have a definite future together and I’m afraid of loosing my friend.

Anyway, after Jeff and Ashley left, it was just me and my Amanda, and Jason and his Amanda.  I figured we would stay for a few hours, maybe till 1 or so and then head home.  Well, it was so much fun being there with them and talking with them that we all stayed up talking until about 5 in the morning.  At this point, I was too tired to drive home, granted I could have powered through, but Jason and Amanda offered for us to use the pull-out bed.  We took them up on the offer.  The next morning Jason made pancakes, really freakin thick pancakes.  I swear, like at least a half an inch thick, if not thicker.  It was a great time.  I am looking forward to doing it again hopefully soon.

This autocross had a few firsts for me.  Probably the best first that I had was that I slid my car around a turn.  Granted, it wasn’t a slide that would make me turn faster, it was a slide that came from entering the turn to fast…a power slide, if you will.  I also got pretty good with the Scandinavian Flick.  It is a quick snap of the steering wheel to throw the car a little bit.  I used the skill in the final turn coming out of the Chicago box so that my rear end would not slide through the final cone (giving me a 2 second penalty).

It was quite the experience racing again, expecially because I was on all season tires.  The tires only held for the first three runs.  After that, it all went downhill.  I had another problem during the autocross too.  My car has lately been experienceing power loss.  This came into play during a few of my laps, and it definately slowed me down a little bit in a few corners.

This power loss has been getting worse lately and today it finally peaked for me.  I say peaked because I don’t want to imagine that it could possibly get any worse without not running at all.  I finally took my car to a mechanic today and basically told him to get me running good again.  I did give him a few items that I didn’t want done if they needed it because they are easiest enough for me to do.  For now, I am driving my parents Durango (which I hate, but it gets me around for now).  I will give an update when I get the car back.  I told the mechanic that I needed it back by Saturday.  Hopefully he can, because I have an autocross on Sunday and would really like to run again.

Step two is not necessary, but I would like to do it because it would make my car better on the track.  There are some suspension components that could be upgraded that would allow me to be more competitive.  Of course these won’t be purchased until I get a little bit more money.  I would also like to get another set of rims and tires for my car, but that too needs to wait until I get some more money.  I am hoping that I will be able to get at least the latter by the first race of next season.  That gives me a few months to come up with the money.

The third thing I would like to do, depending on how mean my car is after the second set of upgrades, is look into either getting my engine a little bit more pep, or getting a racing seat.  If the car is doing what I predict it will do after all the suspension upgrades, I imagine that I will not be able to hold myself in place when I corner, hence the racing seat.  If I can still manage to hold myself in place, I will probably spring for some more engine pep, as in acceleration, not horsepower.  I figure a lightened crankshaft pulley and lightened flywheel ought to do the trick.

Because I know those won’t get the car where I want it to be in the grand scheme of things, there is one final upgrade I would like to do.  One of the last, but definitely not the least of the upgrades to come will be a different engine.  This will take some time, considering I need to first find and engine, then I need to pull mine out (including the transmission), and swap it with the new one.  After that comes the fun part (not really) of getting all the wiring installed and overall getting the thing to work.  I know it is going to be a lot of work, but considering this is my project car, it will be worth it.  My car will be a beast of a track car when I am done.  If all goes well, it could eventually be used for something more than just autocross.

It’s official now.  My mountain biking races are finished for this year.  I wish I could say I went out with a bang, however, I did not.  When I was getting ready for the race (the morning of), I was thinking ahead and packed Advil knowing that when I bike in a race I bike very intense and normally my lower back starts to hurt.  Normally if I take some Advil before i race, I don’t notice the pain as much during the race.  Forgetful Kenny didn’t remember to take the Advil before the race started.  Not only that, I couldn’t take any once I started racing either because it was back in the vehicle.

Just like clockwork, I started to feel the lower back pain at the top of the first climb (which is 4 miles by the way).  It still wasn’t bad enough that I was out of the competition, so I continued to push forward.  It wasn’t until after the second climb of the race that I started to realize that I was going to be out of the competition.  It was getting difficult for me to stand and pedal, which is an important aspect of mountain bike riding.  The third and final climb (large climb anyway) put the pain over the top.  I actually had to get off my bike and try to stretch my back and get the blood flowing back into it again (it was another biker’s suggestion I gathered while climbing hill three).  It did work for a little while.  My back felt refreshed for about a mile but then I was right back to were started (not literally, because then I would have finished the race).  After that last mile of feeling good, everything went to crap.  A section of the course that I know I can normally ride at about 10-15 mph I was doing at about 2 mph because that was the only way to keep the pain at a minimum.  All I wanted to do was finish the race in one piece.  And I eventually did, in seventh place.

The other members of Team Summit Junkies also entered the race, as did my uncle Chris.  Steve took first in his age group, my mom took second out of all the beginner females, and Chris took first out of his age group in the beginners.  As for my dad, well, he did come in fourth place in the same age group as Steve, however my dad had a pretty bad accident during the race.  He was probably less than two tenths of a mile away from the finish line and he flipped over the front of his bike and rammed his shoulder into the ground, tearing a ligament that holds one of his shoulder bones in place.  He was able to get back on his bike an finish the race, however, he now needs to have his arm in a sling.  It doesn’t fit my dad seeing him with any type of medical stuff on him.

That is my update on the race.  As I predicted, it wasn’t nearly as much fun as the Ole Bull race.  I am looking forward to that race again next year.

I know that I changed my theme not all that long ago, however, I’m a little disappointed with it already.  It is not nearly as clean as it could be.  I mean, I can see vertical lines in the light blue sections along both sides of the main section.  So here is the deal.  I am very tempted to change my theme.  I’d like to take the time to pick a new one, however I’m curious what the reader wants.  Let me know.  Feel free to comment or use the poll below.  Thanks.