Twin Creek Roubaix ~ Airborne

Yes praise the Lord! Thank you Jesus! I wanted to race real bad this Sunday. My legs felt great and I knew that my team wanted to do good. I told Rish and Gamm that I would tow them all day long. With race day approaching the weather looked good for the race. Hard rain and with the dirt road in the race I was smiling ear to ear.

Race day the rain was coming down hard and they changed the course. No dirt road, and a long climb 7 times during the race. The race started and I tried to protect Gamm from the wind in the first mile of the race. I noticed he was fine on his own so I moved to the front and chased an attack by Roadhouse.

The big climb was getting closer and I started watching Pat O'Donnell and before the first lap was over 3 of us were in a break. Royden Kern and Pat O'Donnell talked me into working with them 5 miles later. 40 miles left in the race and I took my turns in the front. We kept pulling away from the rest of the riders. Which made me wonder am I doing the right thing by leaving my team behind?

2 laps to go and my legs are feeling bad again, just like last weekend in the winning break. I prayed real hard and I ate a banana. Then I proceeded to down a water bottle. Then I prayed that my legs would recover. I kept thinking about losing again.

I started to feel a little better after 5 miles, then I saw my Dad's group ahead. I told Pat and Royden "we have to catch them". So Pat took a huge pull and so did Royden. As we went by my Dad I said, "Hey Dad", we watched the sprint as we had 1 lap to go. I told Royden and Pat, "I think my Dad just won the sprint", sure enough after the race Dad said he won the field sprint for 10th. I told him I won my sprint too!

Jeremy Grimm gets the Man-Animal Award for today, so good. So I was a little bummed about there being no dirt road section today, I wanted to find the breaking point of my Bianchi.....ok maybe its good that it wasnt included. There were only 3 elites today, Grimm, Rish, and myself, and I think we are all pretty happy to get the W over Texas Roadhouse, once again great job Jeremy. So as we rolled out today I realized that I spent more time on my bike yesterday than I spent sleeping last night, Miami U. = Debauchery. Im not really sure what happened during todays race, there were breaks left and right and I was so tierd that I wasnt to sure what was going on around me, I got 7th given the circumstances I guess that will work. I had Reba Mcentires song 'Fancey' and George Straights 'Run' in my head the whole race, strange to say the least.

-So you might be asking what the heck I was doing until 5am last night, well I met a girl at a block party at 5pm (i had planned on going home at 7, ha) and we went to dinner, a soroity semi-formal, a bar, and a party.....we decided that these all counted as seperate dates and that we have been dating for a month and a half....Girls like that get Guys like me in trouble, this is what im left to ponder during several hours of beating myself on a bicycle, frightening.
- 3 weeks from now im going to be in the Bahamas, hot.
- 3 hours from now ill be working on a paper, not hot.
- Wilkesville next weekend, kinda excited.
Thanks again to my teamates today, good stuff.

Another great OVRC race. With two and a half laps to go, the number two man on the GC from Wheelie Fun made his big move. Blair was on him like stink on a skunk. It was a small enough break that I thought it best to let them go. I knew Blair could handle himself and with four places to give up and still win the GC, he was still in great shape in a 6-man break. Couple of times we almost caught them, but with seven guys left in the second group, including two SH and 2 Wheelie Fun, we were destined to watch them slowly drift away.

My moment of glory was on the final lap, I could see my companions in the group were struggling on the rollers, so near the top of one of those rollers, I put the juice on and, sure enough, drifted away from the other six. I got a pretty good lead and felt strong, holding 26-27mph around the back stretch of the course. Eventually, though, Jeremy's dad reeled me in, just before the last hill. I sat on until the top of the hill and surged again. I dropped everyone but the Grimm Reaper. As we neared the finish line, I drifted left and flubbed a gear shift, opening the door for you-know-who to come around. Still, I'm very happy with my fitness today and 8th place aint bad - my best finish of the year.

Kudos to Blair for finishing exactly where he needed to and for buying dinner after the race. Props also to Jay (Model T) who raced a great race as a probationary SH. Finally, a big nod to Der Kaiser, J. German for pulling Blair up to the big break and for pulling the whole peleton around 3/4 of the course on lap 2 to string out the field. Das ist gut, ja!

The weather on the drive down was looking pretty bleak. But the rain stopped just after we arrived at the start area and we even had a bit of sun by the end of the race. The course was great - even without the gravel. In fact the fast, twisty descent would have been taken out if we did the gravel option. So I guess you lose some fun and get some different fun in return.

My legs were not feeling the love today after yesterday's 40 mile break. So I planned to just sit in and wait until I felt better before making any moves. But the cross winds and aggressive racing made that a bad option. The father back I was, the more I got guttered. It was pretty much consistent suffering for the first two laps, closing gaps and searching for a wheel until a small group split off the front from sheer attrition...then things got harder. Before the split there were breaks in the pace. But now the pace just stayed high and I was still firmly planted in the gutter gutting it out. At one point I looked back expecting to see the rest of the field and no one else was there! We were down to about 15 riders. I finally figured out that riding the gutter was not a good plan. For all the effort it took, I may as well be on the front helping the chase. So I moved up and started working. Things got a lot easier because I could finally get a good draft in the pace line. Larry had apparently figured this out long before me as he was working the chase long before I was.

People were occasionally attacking our group so I countered one of the moves really hard to see what would happen. Two guys covered and we had a good gap, but no one wanted to work. The race finished in a group sprint into the wind - which is not my thing. I threw my bike at the line for a dramatic effort at 14th place. This will hopefully make for a good finish line camera photo if nothing else.

All in all I'm happy with the result. Racing with tired legs on such a tough day it was quite an effort just to finish in the field. It was also great to see Larry racing so well again today.

Will made a perfect call on the weather, at race time it could hardly have been better. This was a deceptivley tough course, even without a gravel road section. My hope is that I wouldn't have missed the split without the fatigue from yesterdays race, but that will never be known and we were destined to ride the laughing group today with a few fizzled chase attempts.

Great course, I hope to do it again and wield vengence. The winding downhill stretch was particularly fun and the there seemed to be more turns and doglegs on this road race than most crits. Depending on the wind and how you felt when you hit them they were either exhilarating or tortuous.

Thanks to all the teams, individuals and sponsors for hosting a great Spring Series.

Kudos to Grimmy for the win in the A race, to Blair and his faithful lieutenants for winning the GC and to Gamm for allowing us to vicariously live the college life we missed out on. I missed baby Todd until you came along.

zCongratulations to Blair the 4/5 GC Champ. Great effort from the whole squad.