There are fast race courses and there are slow race courses. Saturday's race was the Ronde von Evergreen in Carbondale IL. The Ronde is, as they dubbed it, race number 1.5 in the Bubba Series. If you were to look at the race profile for this course you would it would be a fast course. Maybe it was but I felt slow as molasses despite getting a good result. Nevertheless, I was better than last year when I crashed twice within a couple hundred feet

We had a whopping 8 guys in the B race. Our race official, "Major Hardcore" was by the book and wasn't allowing handups. I don't have a problem with that but the Bubba is normally more relaxed. He was sneaky about the start and I got out of the blocks good. I didn't want to get excited and go too hard, but still wanted to get rid of the pretenders.

I did an okay job of that and led for the first 3 laps. Then I faded. I'm not sure why. Despite my fading, I held on to 3rd spot.

The course was much better than last year's turn-fest. There was a nice flow with some long straights and then tight turns as well. The two puddles added a slop element to the race. There were a couple areas that were really bumpy. Maybe that is what contributed to the slow feeling of the race. I just couldn't get a good rhythm and seemed to hit every bump possible. Somewhere along the way I jammed my hip too. My right hip area, not to mention my back, was rather sore Saturday evening and I'm taking some Ibuprofen to get through Sunday's race.

There was a little rain last night so today should be soft ground at the very least.