Long version: After blowing up spectacularly preriding two weeks before, I was hesitant. Fortunately, it was not 95 degrees out this time. As we took off, I realized that when I'd had a flat the last time I rode this bike, I'd just pumped it up enough to limp back to the car. Because I am a moron, I'd not checked the pressure before I started. I bottomed out my back tire a half-dozen times on the climb. Fortunately, I never pinch-flatted. The plus side of that was that I had awesome traction all the way up. I paced myself (perhaps too much) up the climb, but made the top in pretty good shape. Our team-only aid station at the top ran with NASCAR-like efficiency. I got my tire pumped up, a new bottle, and a lube job and was on my way in less than a minute.
As I headed down the first stretch of single track on Sunrise, I heard "hey, did you ride Napa a couple weeks ago?" When I agreed that I had, I heard "I was the guy you were duelling with the entire time." It was Dan, whom I'd beaten by 3 seconds at Skyline. Once we hit the next stretch of fire road, I left him behind.
Most of the way down was uneventful. My too-small bike started to cause my back to crunch up pretty much by the start of the extended downhill section, and the combination of that with riding a hardtail made most of the descent pretty painful. The thing about Downieville, though, is that if you're gonna do it, you've got to commit. So I rode plenty of stuff that without the mental momentum would have had me walking on many rides. I wasn't going that fast, though, being underbiked, and I ended up pulling over a half dozen times to let people go by. I did start to suffer a little cramping here, but oddly enough, it was in my arms, from wrestling with the bars trying to coax my hardtail down the rocks. I also stopped halfway down to drop off a CO2 cartridge to someone who needed one.
I was feeling pretty bad by this point
As I entered the very last section of singletrack, I heard "hey, it's my friend from Napa" behind me. Now, given where we were in the overall scheme of things it wasn't a huge deal, but I think it was still a mistake for him to have said that, because I proceeded to bury myself. The singletrack ends with two shortish climbs and then a quick downhill drop. I only remembered the first climb. I hammered up the first incline, only to turn a corner and see the last uphill section. After spending that much effort getting away from my rival, I was damned if I was gonna let him catch me. I started chanting "Must. Not. Die." as I slowly turned the pedals over working to get up that last hill.
Onto the pavement, finally, and I was feeling a little confident. There were a couple little rises which almost did me in, but I was able to struggle to the finish, beating that guy Dan by a whole 7 seconds this time. I was pretty damn wrecked, though. I lay around for more than an hour, too nauseous to do anything but sip water and hope that my body finally figured out it was done.
The conference room filled up fast and the draw of FREE! hot Noahs coffee and bagels was irresistable. It was estimated that over 50 people attended both the classroom session and the trail work portions of the course. The classroom session was very eye opening. Short of the hard physical labor and bureaucracy involved the basic principles of building and maintaining a fun sustainable and environmentally friendly trail are relatively simple. 
After the very professional classroom presentation we all made our way up to the staging area just outside the trails of Mt Sutro. We were greeted by more of the Mt Sutro Stewards and FREE! pizza which despite the vast quantity managed to dissapear rather quickly. We were going to need all the energy we could get for what was coming next.
Jason Van Horn from IMBA gives us a crash course on safety and tool use before we hit the trails.
It was time to hit the trails. I don't think most of the attendee's knew what they were in for. IMBA and SF Urban Riders weren't going to give away all that food and beer for free. 4+ hours of heavy labor among some of the thickest poison ivy growth I've seen is what greeted us at the top.
We weren't up there doing trail maintenance. We were carving a large fresh trail out of thickly overgrown densely rooted earth with fallen trees and PO everywhere. See the jungle Kalleigh is standing in? This is how it looked when the work began...
And 4 hours later a rough but distinctive trail had been cut out. My beerkalometer tells me it was at least 100 to 200 yards long.
There were a few minor obstacles...
It is absolutely amazing to see what the focused efforts of even a group of amateur trailbuilders can do in under 5 hours. Alot of change could be made in the local MTBing community if volunteer efforts like these were more frequent. If the hikers and equestrians saw as much of this as they do our dust clouds then the hostile environment we encounter might indeed change drastically. I intend to continue helping when I can and hope that more of us MTBers will take time out to volunteer so that we all can enjoy these trails for many years.
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