I did the Brooklyn OH race put on by SnakeBite, my second race ever. The venue is a city park with ~50ft of elevation change. It was a very nice layout but due to the monsoon rains all week until Saturday night, it was a mud bog. I did the C race/slog, started slow and just focused on staying upright. Riding in the 3-4" deep muddy grass was amazingly hard; I think I used my back brake once or twice a lap and never touched the front. Didn't really need it, and I figured it would put me on my head.
At the beginning of the bell lap I was slowly reeling in three riders ahead of me, then one of them picked up a bit of 'speed' and disappeared. Around this time my RD jammed in between gears, so I stopped, managed to get it fixed in my low gear, then kept going. Normally this would be a problem, but at this point even my 34-26 was a bit too tall on the mud flats. I somehow got within 20 feet of the two riders ahead of me, but they were much better on the remounts and were able to keep re-gapping me. Sadly, I had nothing left in the tank to make an attack.
Overall, I was pleased to have just finished; quite an experience. The grass was actually more of an issue than the mud - took 5 minutes to hose the mud off, then an hour to pull grass out of everywhere.
Can't wait to see some pictures...