Olympic View Road Race State Championship

Wow. That is a long title. I did well here 2 years ago and took 6th. Last year I bonked on the climb and that later would be the first sign of my 3 month battle with Mono. This year everything was different. We had Gabe and me in Cat 4's and Travis and Greg in Masters Cat 4. We would be racing 3 laps of an 18 mile loop for a total of around 54 miles with only 1 real hill. Coming into the race I was kind of worried about that hill based on what happened to me on it last year. As we came around for the first lap I kept waiting for this wall of a climb but as we got to the wonderful downhill hairpin corner I realized that hill is really not even a hill, more like a roller. Since last year leading up to it my mind made it into the biggest climb ever. Lap 1 complete and a few attacks went off the front with 1 guy who would be off the front all the way until about 7 miles to go. I stayed mostly mid pack for the majority of the race. Somewhere during the 2nd lap I see Gabe come drifting back towards me then I hear people yelling flat. Dang. There goes my only teammate. Really sucked for Gabe to flat but he did finish, good job Gabe. I began moving to the front on the last lap and when I got there the solo guy off the front was still out there and I was beginning to worry as nobody in the field was interested in doing any work to bring him back. Several teams had a lot of numbers but nobody would get on the front to work together. That was a bit frustrating as some teams had upwards of 7 guys in the field but only 1 or 2 did anything. Oh well. This is Cat 4 racing at its finest. I was active on the front with Starbucks and a couple other individual guys to keep the pace higher than it had been. It got a bit dicey going up the hill before the downhill corners. I seemed to always be behind the guy that didn't want to go that fast. This created alot of yelling from several of us to get out of the way. Once we made it over the hill, we started to come around for the downhill hairpin and I saw my chance to move up towards the front. In bicycle racing especially, everyone always fans out real wide to set up for the corner. This always leaves the inside wide open and I took advantage of it by diving to the inside and gaining several positions. Once we started down the hill it was full gas. Erik from Apex was on the front and laying down a fast pace. I was roughly 6th wheel at that stage right in the middle of the swarming pack of crazy Cat 4 racers. I could see the sign for 200m (which was set out at 400m to give us the whole road) and as we got closer several guys just to the right of me started bumping as more guys were coming up on the shoulder of the road. Again, crazy Cat 4's. Well, that took out at least 6 or more guys, as bumping each other at 30+mph on the shoulder won't last for too long. Thankfully I was just to the left of it and they mostly flew into the ditch. An ex fellow motorcycle road racer who I used to pit next to, Paul Bishop (Recycled Cycles) was the guy I put my eyes on in the beginning of the race to be there at the finish, based in his performance at Walla Walla Crit. When we hit 400m to go not much happened and then Paul took off from my right at 300m to go. I hesitated for a second as that was a long way to go with the finish being slightly uphill. The guy in front of me started his sprint and then I came around him. I was going farther out than I would have preferred but I had to at this point. I realized once I got out in the wind on my own, it would be really hard to catch Paul. He had a big gap on me and laid down a serious sprint. With the finish line almost to my front wheel I could feel my legs starting to scream at me and begin grinding to a halt. I looked down to see if any wheels were coming close and on the right of me someone was getting closer. I put in one more pedal stroke and stretched out as far as I could. A quarter wheel lengths to my right was third place. I held on for 2nd place. PHEW. It was close and painful. My disappointment for not getting 1st was short lived as Paul had a 2-3 bike length gap on us. He deserved the win with that sprint. I am happy with 2nd place. Then to hear that Greg got 3rd in Masters as well was great stuff for the team. Thanks to my lovely wife Lindsay for being there to get the podium shot. That is two races now Lindsay has attended and I have been on the podium. My good luck charms! Great job to the whole team. Thanks to Amara from WheelsinFocus for the below shots. The first one is a good shot as it really tells you the pain I was in and shows it. That was the point where my legs were telling me they were done.

Tour of Walla Walla

There were some great races leading up to the Tour of Walla Walla April 21st & 22nd. First was a race I haven't done in a couple years, the Northshore TT and Road Race up near Bellingham. Both of these races were great to do prior to Walla Walla. The TT course was nice and this was the first real effort on the TT bike this year. I spent some time on it via the trainer but nothing at full gas. I changed my position a little with a longer stem and messed with my seat as well. I think it worked out well. I took 16th in the TT 1:44 behind the winner. Not to shabby for me as I am not very good at TT's. Then the next day was the Northshore Road Race. This course I remember well as it was one of my top 5 worse experiences on the bike. The course is good but it has 500ft of climbing per lap and we would be doing 4 laps of the 9 mile course. I put on a different set of wheels and didn't tune the bike up prior to the race. I was able to make the ghost shifting work up until the last lap when I fell off the back of the pack and came home in 32nd place. It was pretty frustrating but I think if I didn't have to deal with the inconsistent shifting I might have been able to hang on until the finish. Still all in all a good weekend warm up prior to Walla Walla. Tour of Walla Walla I love this race. I have been coming here since my first year racing. The organizers changed it up this year with the Criterium being first and then the TT in the afternoon. Travis, Gabe and I would be the only teammates racing. We arrived on Friday and took our TT bikes out and road the TT course. The Criterium was my main focus as I have done well on this course and finished 5th last year. It has 8 corners, rough pavement and it’s flat. All things I don't mind, especially the cornering. I was going to try and go for a time bonus on one of the prime laps but the man to beat from Starbucks got himself in a break and took all the bonus time. We caught him about 2 laps from the finish. I moved up to the front on the last lap and held the position well until half way around when I got a little too relaxed and fell back a few places. This is where I lost the chance to fight for the win. Coming through one of the final few corners someone went wide and pushed several guys up to the curb. With my relaxed position this put me behind this group and I close the gap down to the front guys. I arrived 3 corners before the finish and moved up to about 15th wheel or so. Then coming through the final corner I took the inside and got behind a guy that decided to sit up. I cursed myself again and moved out and started my sprint real early. I was able to bring it home in 9th place and Gabe followed suit and came in 10th. Good showing for the team and Gabe is our GC guy so that was good to see. I was really upset with myself the rest of the day. I went back to the hotel and sat in my room and watched TV until it was time to get ready for the TT.

Time trial: My goal was to use the anger I had from the crit to channel it into the Time trial since I kind of suck at TT's. I got a good long warm up in with Travis and was able to put together my best TT ever. I finished 21st 1:46 behind the winner. Gabe finished 10th 1:09 behind the winner. Great result.

The road race has never been good to me, including this year. -My first year racing as a Cat 5 I somehow ended up in the Cat 3 field. Duh. I lasted until the end of the first lap then realized my mistake and called it a day. -The next year I made it into the correct race. I got a thumb tack stuck in my front wheel on the neutral roll out and flatted about 2 miles after the start of the race. I was able to chase back on but I caught up to everyone just as we got to the big hill and fell off the back again. -This year I was in much better shape overall and my goal was to maintain my top 20 position on the General Classification and help Gabe as much as possible. The pace was pretty slow to start out as Starbucks was trying to control the race for their GC guy Tony. We were hitting close to 50 mph on the first major decent and at the bottom is a tight left hand corner. About 30 yards from the corner my tire exploded. It sounded like someone shot a gun in the pack. It was so loud it hurt my ears. My tire blew off of the rim so getting slowed down all the way was a little painful. I got it stopped and the wheel change was pretty bad. After getting the wheel on and putting my chain back on I couldn't see the rest of the field. My race was over 15 miles into it. So I road solo for about 45 miles but did catch up to Travis D and we cruised in together. I finished 49th.