So, I was kneeling on the ground for 30 minutes, fumbling around with the tiny lock nut of my UST valve. The track supervisors stood around me, giving me well meant advice - but the only thing that I needed right then was a damn wrench to loosen that stupid little nut.
Instead I had already developed blisters on my fingers and rage that was getting hard to control, because everyone was passing me, or should I say, everyone "had passed" me. Everyone was already long gone.
I cursed and ran the danger of getting disqualified.

Mad, really mad!

But, I should start at the beginning.
The preparation did not go well. Last weekend I discovered that my rear hub was busted and quickly brought my bike to my trusted salesman and instructed him to fix it. "You can pick it up again on Tuesday", he said.
So, I gave him some extra time and went there on Saturday expecting to receive my repared racing bike.
However, his mechanic held a bag out toward me and said he had established that the hub was defective.
"Master Schurich!" - ran through my head -"That was actually the reason that I brought my bike to you". He wasn't able to fix it right there on the fly (which I hadn't expected him to be able to, which is why I had brought it in a week earlier), but he gave me a different bike. What choice did I have? I was leaving for Wombach in 2 hours.

Upon arrival, I found a parking spot, rolled out my sleeping bag and went to sleep. The next morning, I woke up to a beautiful sunrise that shone right through the hatch of my car.
It was 6 o' clock. If I had wanted to get up that early, I could have slept at home. At least now I have some time to spare! I had breakfast and got dressed very comfortably and rolled up to the starting line. This was my first race in Wombach and despite all of the professionalism I was thrilled by the familiar atmosphere.

The view from the bedroom.

I shared my bed with her.

And off we went over the long distance of 59m/95km and 7874 vertical ft/2400hm, on very little gravel and a lot of trails, until something started feeling funny.
My front tire was losing air. For a UST rider this was a rare phenomenon. "I have latex milk in my tires that'll seal it and the air'll hold for 2 more hours anyway". So, I stopped, pumped up the tire and kept going. However, after 30 minutes, I was in the exact same situation. Nothin' doin', I had to thread the back up tube. So, I took off the tire and started working on the afore mentioned nut - no chance, the piece of sh.. wouldn't move an inch. What now? I put the tire back on and pumped like a madman. Pumping up UST with dried up latex milk with a little hand pump is no picnic.
Air was back in the tire though and I kept going, hoping that the next track supervisor would have a wrench. He didn't, but my tire had lost a bunch of air again. I pumped some more.
The intervals got shorter and shorter and I decided to drop out of the race. That wasn't a possibility though, because I was located in the middle of the Spessart. I didn't know where I was and the race only had one lap. Murphy's Law. So, I had no choice but to kneel in the afore mentioned dirt and get that valve off somehow. After about 30 minutes it finally gave and I found the culprit responsible for the air loss. Thorns. Little Thorns, which led to the next problem. I couldn't get at them.
Not from the inside, nor from the outside. At this point it didn't matter anymore anyway, so I kind of snipped them off (that'll work for now), put the tube back in and pumped it up again.I thought I was the last guy left on the track. The fun and games cost me almost 60 minutes. The horror! Well, I wasn't last... but damn near!

The girls weren't really "al dente" anymore, but the pasta was!

Ândreas Bader