On The Pegs December 2018 - Volume 3 - Issue 12 | Page 84

On The Pegs
STEWARD BAYLOR
The conditions were terrible. It was prob-
ably the worst race conditions I’ve ever
ridden in. It was just extremely dry and the
dust lingered. It was very tough to see. I had
a couple sections, or a section every day
that I struggled in. So I never had I guess a
really good, all-day ride. Which means, in
certain tests I would catch the guys in my
better tests, but then my worse tests would
knock me back. So I was staying around
fifth, sixth place overall. The certain tests,
the really rough tests, the gnarly tests, I
would catch the guy ahead of me. But then
the other tests, he would gap me back out
and that would even us out for the next day,
but I still wasn’t starting where I wanted to
be until the last day. The last day we had a
really good day. I think I beat fifth overall
by over a minute going into the final moto.
But as far as dry, sketchy, it was some of the
scariest stuff I’ve ever raced on. It was just
really easy to make a mistake, and a big
mistake at that. That’s what I was thinking
about. I had some of the biggest crashes
this week than I’ve ever had in my entire
life. After the first one on day one, I’m lucky
to be walking.
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