I raced my first World Champion Mountain Bike event on Wednesday September 1st, and you could say that it was one that I will never forget. I did not race until 2:00pm by which it was about 90 degrees with over 60% humidity. I have never raced in those conditions and when training, I usually try my hardest not to ride when it is like that. But since I could not change the race time, I just had to go with it. Warming up, I stuffed an ice bag down my jersey to keep myself cool before the start. It helped some but not enough, I was still crazy hot. The call up to the start line was the most amazing call up I have been in. The staging area was out of sight of the start line. The announcer started to call riders names at about 5 second intervals. Once a name was called each competitor rode down the grass to the start line. During this whole time there was really dramatic music playing, it kind of reminded me of the music that was played in Harry Potter during one of the quidich matches. I was the 5th rider called up which was really exciting. Elke Brutsaert, my coach, waited for me at the start where she had a cooler full of ice and cold towels which I used to try and cool myself down before the start because I was already so hot. When the gun was shot and we started the race, everybody sprinted as hard as they could to the first turn of the course. The course started out fairly simple, but before long we started the first climb which was really steep and got super clogged up. At the top of the hill it veered off into the trees and the technical section began. Even though I rode this part in my pre-ride the trail was so congested that I had to run. About halfway through the start loop I really started to overheat and I got the chills and felt all shaky, but I ignored that and kept riding. As the race progressed the field grew apart more and more so it was much easier to ride. This course was the most technical one I have ever raced and probably one of the most technical trails I have done in general. On my second lap, I saw on the side of the trail a girl passed out with what I assumed was heat stroke. At that point the heat was starting to really get to me also. As I was riding, I was feeling very sick and light headed but every time I got off my bike to run a section that feeling intensified by five, so I tried my hardest to ride everything. By then I was not trying to make up any positions in the race but just to maintain the pace I was going. The girl that I raced with at Windham, from Chili, was riding right with me and we were going back and forth the whole time. I would get ahead on the climb and she would get me on the decent. However, on the last lap she never came by on the downhill. The finish of that race was one of the most relieving feelings ever. I was starting to get really light headed and dizzy on my last lap, making stupid mistakes and riding off the course a little. When I finished, I tried to get off of my bike but as soon as I stood up I was overwhelmed with the feeling that I was going to pass out. So I just sat on my bike for a little while Marc Gullickson, the USA Junior Team coach, was pouring bottles of cold water on me. The feeling only got worse so he called over the team doctor and the two of them helped me into a chair where I had ice and cold towels piled on me. While I was sitting the doctor informed me that I was suffering from heat stroke. I was super relaxed until my arms went numb and I could not move my fingers, after that I started to get a little bit worried. I had to lay by the finish tent about an hour with ice bags all over me. However, my body temperature was still extremely high. Therefore, I was moved back to my hotel room and put in to the bathtub with four bags of ice. After about 45 minutes of that I was finally able to stand on my own and walk around. Even though I did not get the result I wanted I was still very pleased that I finished the race in the top 20. This season turned out to be the best ones yet. I had a lot of fun and learned a lot. After some of the experiences that I had, I am now extremely motivated for next season and excited to see what happens.