Colonelmom-wow, nice work!
Ex- yeah, ouch.
Here's mine, also posted in The 33:
CU Research Park Crit, SW4, 6th/21.
This was my first crit after my crash/separated shoulder last August. I had schizophrenic goals of 1) just do a crit and get over the leftover crash jitters and 2) get on the podium. Goal 1 - well, i still have some work to do, but it wasn't too bad. Goal 2 - nope.
I wasn't very comfortable in the pack for the first few laps, it got a little better as the pack thinned out a bit. There were a couple of people I didn't want to be near but kept ending up on their wheel, and one chick kept pointing at a (orange-paint-marked) manhole and yelling "hole" every lap until I said "shut up" which I wish I hadn't said, oops. But pointing, sheesh.
My fitness is OK but there were some stronger women. I stayed in the top 10 and worked on not working, I tend to chase everything down, I'm trying to learn patience but I just don't know how to tell if a move is a dangerous one that I don't want to let get away vs one that isn't going to stick. I did chase a few, but let other people do it a few times. Achieved my goal of not being in the wind much and not pulling the pack around. I was thinking I would try to go with about 4 to go, but the pace was ramped up by then and it was just all I could do to stay in the lead group. I followed a wheel in a sprint and picked up a couple of places, but I was pretty cooked, achieved my max HR, and NP for the 30 minute crit was above my (newly increased) LT.