I wasn't really sure what to expect this weekend because of my less than ideal training over the last few weeks, but I seemed to get a bit of everything over the 3 days. Here's a day by day rundown of how they went.
Friday Cyclo-stampede C2
I got an ok start and was riding in a group with the usual suspects, but in what seems to be a pretty regular occurrence, a crashed myself out of that group and into no-mans land. I rode there for a while before I had a tire going down so Pam and I did pretty nice, unrehearsed bike exchange. I got the new bike and rode around mentally checked out for a few laps and finished off the race in 27th place. Not so hot, but what I deserved after riding a mentally weak race.
Saturday Java Johny's C2
Saturday I got to the course plenty early and did lots of preriding to try to get tire pressure and my lines dialed before it was go time. I felt quite a bit better going into Saturday than I did about Friday's race. Another CrossVegas-esqe pile up happened about 20 feet off the start line and I got tangled for a bit and had to get off my bike and run through the carnage. I eventually made it back to the back of a reasonable group, but burnt a few too many matches making it there. I spent most of the day on damage control trying to hold on, but blew up in the last few laps and came in 24th, just inside the payout. I rode a good bit better Saturday, and was able to live with myself a little bit easier knowing that I didn't take any laps off mentally during this race.
Sunday Bio Wheels C1
I woke up feeling pretty wrecked from the two previous day's efforts, but it seemed that almost everyone was in the same boat. I did a good bit of preriding and the course seemed like it would suit me ok with a good amount of climbing and some semi technical areas. I played it a bit safe at the start and hung back trying to avoid the pile up that plagued me the day before. I found myself in a huge group that the front was about 15th place and it was probably 20 people deep, so if I blew out of that group any decent place was long gone. Luckily we got rid of some people and the group was down to about 3 or 4 of us pretty quickly. People came and went in the group, but I could seem to get away and up to the UCI points just up the road. Going into the last lap it was me, Dan Campbell, and some Cal Giant Strawberry's guy and the pace was getting pretty tough on me. They dropped me on the climb with about a half lap to go and I was able to ride in fairly easily for 20th spot. Not great, but I felt better about it than any of the other races of the weekend. I just need to get rolling a little better to get some more UCI points. I feel like it's coming though.
After Sunday's race we went back to Chris and Kim's for a shower and some food. We were so ready to go home, but we didn't realize how wrecked we would be after the long weekend and Lauren already bought tickets to a concert in Cincy. We were on the fence as to what to do with them, but we ended up going in for about an hour and then skipping out for Bloomington. We got home at around 1:00 AM and it was all we could do to stay awake on the drive. Overall it was an awesome weekend and just a preview to the good times to be had this weekend at the Hilly Hundred.
Sorry for the Ryan Knapp picture overload...
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