Wenatchee Omnium Stage Race

Lindsay and I left Friday and arrived at our "fine" hotel in Wenatchee. I guess we shouldn't expect too much out of a $49 hotel but hey it did have free breakfast with a waffle maker. I love waffles.

Saturday Morning Time Trial:

I met with Rolly and Mark there at the hotel and we changed and headed out to ride the TT course. It was a fairly easy course with a few rolling hills. The biggest concern was going to be how the wind was come Saturday morning. I borrowed some TT equipment from my teammate Travis Dougan. He gave me his disc wheel with his power tap, his space helmet, and TT bars. The bars wouldn't fit on mine so that was the only thing I wasn't going to be able to use. I took the last 3 spacers out of my handle bars so I could get the front of my body in a more aero position. I lined up at the start line and we were going off every 30 seconds but the person in front of me was a no show so I didn't have anyone to try and chase. That could be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you look at it. I have never trained or used a Power tap before so I tried not to mess with it too much. I had my cadence, speed and power up on the screen and just tried to keep my cadence right around 100 rpm's. I went out and turned around and then the suffering began. There was a strong headwind on the way back to the start/finish line. Its pretty demoralizing peddling as hard as you can and just not going anywhere. I hunkered down as much as I could to make myself as small as possible and made sure to keep my elbows in to limit any drag. The TT was 9 miles of being in your red zone the whole time. I was pretty wiped out afterward and never using a power tap before I cleared everything as I went across the line thinking it would save it. Oops. No data. I found out later in the evening I finished 15th. Not to bad I thought and having those things from Travis I beleive made alot of difference. Just imagine if I had a specific Time Trial bike? Maybe next year. FINISH 14th / 24:49.93 minutes




Saturday Evening Criterium:

We had our coaches from Cycle U there this weekend for the road team which was a huge help, Coach Ed, Coach Kristi, and Coach Lang. We arrived at the course downtown Wenatchee at 3 pm and walked the circuit with Ed and Lang. This was a huge help and just talking tactics and things to watch out for and lines to be on was great stuff and a huge advantage I think. We lined up and the promoters shortened our race from 30 minutes to 20 minutes. This we believe was the reason the criterium was so brutal. It was non-stop and there was never a chance to rest, not even a little bit. I began to fall back a bit in the first few laps. The course was 4 right hand turns with the last corner being a nice little hill a block long and the first corner being the downhill part for a total of .6 miles. The second corner at the bottom of the hill had a man hole cover right in the middle of the corner. I found that I was able to carry a ton more speed in the first downhill corner and then make up even more ground on the guys in the corner with the man hole cover. It was a bit sketchy and I did hit part of the cover one time that bounced me all the way to the outside of the corner but other than that this is where I would make up my ground. The group I managed to catch up to had 4 or 5 guys in it. Each lap I practiced the move in the first and second corner and every time it seemed to work. A big help was having Coach Ed yelling at me to close the gab and just yelling encouragement. We came around for the final lap and I was at the back of our group right where I wanted to be. The reason I was carrying so much more corner speed was everyone would stop pedaling hard and soft pedal in between the two corners. I was able to get the bicycle upright in the middle of the first corner and start pedaling hard almost all the way down the hill to the second corner. Then my momentum would carry me through the second corner. I was able to get every line I wanted on those two corners and I moved closer to the front of the group for the short hill climb. Once on the straight for the start/finish, I out sprinted the guy in front of me to finish ahead of my group. The majority of the field was dropped and pulled from the course along with Mike and Mark who hung on as long as possible. Rolly finished in the top 5 after finishing 3rd in the Time Trial. FINISH 9th



Sunday Road Race:

We were racing 33 miles and after a 3 mile roll out it was 12 miles up hill. Coach Ed and Coach Kristi spoke to us before our start time and just said ride your own pace up the hill. Let the eager guys go up the hill fast and pop. I hung with Rolly as long as I could and he just motored up the hill. I was able to latch on to a couple guys and we paced ourselves up the hill. We made it to the church for the neutral water.



The climb at some sections were 21% and really tough. I tried to stay in the saddle as long as I could then take a couple short breaks standing up. Once we got to the very top it was beautiful scenery and a mass relief. My plan was to hang on during the climb and make up my time on the decent. When we reached the top we had a group of 4 or so. I immediately stood up and hammered the pedals and took off. The decent was pretty fun with some tight corners and some fast sweepers. I broke the group behind me and was on my own, elbows in, knees in, and chin on handle bars allowed me to reach 48 mph! I passed a few guys on the way down the hill and as I was coming to the end of the decent I looked back to see one of the guys left. I waited for him to catch back up so we could work together. We could see a large group at the bottom of the decent. Adam and I have worked together before at some other races and always chat it up in the peloton. This worked out well as we both took very quick turns at the front pulling each other along. As we got to the bottom of the hill the corner marshal for some reason thought it would be ok to keep 2 cars waiting pretty much in the middle of the intersection. One of the guys that I followed on the climb was fixing his bike so I assume he crashed there in the intersection. Then we came up behind the follow car and the race official. They decided to stop in the middle of the corner. Adam and I were pretty fired up at that point and yelled at them as we had the momentum and worked so hard to catch the group in front of us only to have the official stop the car right in front of us. After a few choice words we got back to our rotation and finally caught the group. Now there was close to 9 of us as we picked up a few more guys. About 2 miles before the finish I was thinking to myself how was I going to out sprint all of these guys. I wasn't feeling to confident I had anything left for a big bunch sprint. A few seconds later I saw bike after bike flying in the air in front of me. Sh*tttttt... I grabbed a handful of brakes and tried at the same time to get my feet out of the clips. I moved over to the right side next to the guard rail to try and avoid the carnage in front of me. I got stopped right in front of Adam and fell over on a bike. Adam was on the ground as he couldn't avoid the bikes and went down fairly hard on someone else. I got out of my clips and looked around and was pushing my bike and going again. We were probably cruising along around 22 mph when the crash happened. A guy and his teammate clipped wheels and that's what started it. As I got going again there were 3 guys in front that missed the wreck and I knew I wasn't going to catch them so I just tried to get as big of a gap as I could between the guys behind me. Thankfully I didn't have to sprint to the line and finish in 10th place. Rolly finished in the top 5 and Mike and Mark finished just after I did. What a great weekend it was.
FINISH 11th.

OVERALL Tied for 10th but listed in 11th place.

I plan on taking the rest of May off and getting back to it in June. Big thanks to the coaches that came out and cheered us on and talked strategy. Lindsay and Jodi for cheering for us from the beer garden and keeping us in line.

Nooksak Road Race

After last weekends flat with 1k to go I was itching to get that out of my system and have a good finish. I got a ride down to the course in Ravensdale with Shawn who was taking a weekend off. We arrived and had several Cycle U guys racing as well as one of the girls racing too who finished 5th in her first road race!! The first lap had a fair bit of drama. As we came around to the back side of the course there was some wheel touching going on in front of me. I was thinking to myself as I was right next to the shoulder where would I go if anyone went down in front of me? About 2 minutes later Mark was on the ground right in front of me. I took evasive action and swerved over in the dirt and missed running over his rear wheel by about 2 inches. I was close to going in the ditch as well but was able to get it under control. The wheel touching that was going on a few minutes earlier was apparently the same guys and this time they swerved over and took several guys down including Mark. As I came around I asked if he was ok and he was up and just about back on his bike. I made sure to get back on the pavement and then slowed with another Cycle U teammate to see if we could get Mark back in the pack. As the pack sped off I couldn't see Mark on the road behind me and the other Mark was hanging out so I decided I should go and get back on before I got dropped. As I read Mark's race report his chain came off as well as his seat was a bit turned, however both Mark's finished the race together. Good work guys.
The course was pretty fun with some rolling hills and a good little climb 1k before the finish and then flattened out at the line. The plan was for Rolly and myself to try and lead each other out at the line. Travis was going to try and stay with us to help lead us out too. Most of the race I was on the shoulder side of the road and as we came up to the hill right before the start line for our final lap, I looked over at Trav and asked him if my rear tire was low. "Yup sure looks like it". Just as he said that it was completely flat and I was out for the 2nd race in a row with a flat. I kinda stood there for a moment and cursed the tire god's. Then I decided to push my bike back to the finish line and once again I was at about the 1k to go sign. Thankfully this time it wasn't the last lap but still pretty frustrating. I arrived at the start/finish to see Shawn and we stood there and watched the finish. Pretty awesome to see Rolly come to the line in 2nd place!!! Atleast that part of the plan worked and I wish I could have been there to help him and get myself a finish. The brand new $45 rear tire I bought 4 days before was toast. It looked like someone took a pocket knife and sliced across the width of the tire. The cut went all the way through the tire. I think next week in Wenatchee I will stay away from the shoulder.

Glenwood Road Race 5/02

I decided on Wed that I was going to do this race and I was able to talk Shawn in to going with me. The forecast was supposed to be showers in the afternoon. Shawn arrived at 6:30 am and we loaded up and headed out. It was fairly warm out and as we got farther south closer to Tacoma it started to rain. We got to the parking lot in Port Orchard, got changed, got the bikes on the trainers and began warming up. The course was 13 miles and we were doing 3 laps I think to complete 40 miles. We had a full field of 50+. As we rolled out Shawn wasn't sure how he was going to do but said he would stick to my wheel. I rolled up to the front but didn't see Shawn. I coasted back and he said to go ahead as his legs were still feeling a bit heavy. With only 10 miles down we were coming to a corner and the pack in front spread out and started yelling. The 5 (I believe) that were at the front all went down in the corner. There was a guy in the middle of the road and 3 others spread out towards the ditch with 1 guy getting up out of the ditch. As we came back by on the following lap there was a bit of gravel on the inside of that corner so I bet thats what they all hit. The course was alot of fun with rolling hills and some good small climbs that weren't hard at all. The finish, again was on a hill but nothing compared to the race prior. I was feeling real good and was itching to try and get in a break. I moved to the front right before a hill and was able to gap the field a bit with another rider. I asked him a few times if he wanted to try and go but he wasn't really interested as we still had another 20 miles to go. So, we sat up and let the pack swallow us up. It was so wet. The spray from the riders in front of you was making things difficult to see. Normally I would try to spit away from myself and not on myself. However it was so wet there was no point. It was so wet. With 2.5 miles to go the pack started closing up and really getting a bit crazy getting themselves in position for the lead out to the line. I was probably 6th wheel and getting ready to make my move when the back end of the bike made the move that you hate. I knew immediately I had a flat but I thought if I didn't look down at it, it would disappear. Nope. I moved over to the yellow line and threw my hand up as the pack flew by. I couldn't believe it. I could see the 1k sign about 100 yards up the road. I flatted that close. I sat there for a minute on the side of the road cussing at anything and everything. I was so wet and annoyed. A follow car pulled up to talk to me and called the sweeper up to pick me up. I rode in the back of the truck back to the parking lot. As we were heading back I saw Shawn with another guy heading to the finish line. That was good to see that he made it. He would later report that he got caught out when that crash happened and the back half of the pack did as well. He finished though and that is what counts. Strong effort to stay with it in the weather conditions. I am on my way now to go buy some new tires as my back Michelin Pro 3 looks like a cheese grader.

Next week Ravensdale Road Race.