i had an unbelievable weekend. truly. i was privileged to fly to a race. R.Ex made it all possible -- he is an unbelievable ambassador for the sport.
flew in, my bike was ready to go (Ex made me feel like a pro!), pre-rode GMR, had some amazing sushi. does it get better? oh, the race. right.
started off my TT conservative for the first 2-3 minutes. still managed to set a power record in that 15-20' duration by 10%. wow. i cruised back to my car and just sat on the bumper for a good 30 minutes, letting that sink in. neither my time nor my result mattered. best-ever days are exceedingly rare. i'd just gone harder than i ever have on a bike -- perhaps harder than i ever have gone in my 40 years on the planet. what more could i ask?
when i saw the results i was pretty shocked that it was only good enough ~35th or so out of ~100 racers. i was psyched by that: i showed up to face good competition. (admission: all weekend people kept talking about thurlow rogers.
"you were just seconds behind thurlow." i figured he was a local hot-shot. i didn't look him up until i returned home.
WOW! that read is worth the few minutes.
i believe i had a chance during the RR, no matter what the ITT/hill climb results showed. in a nutshell, i rode strong and smart. found myself at or near the front -- strength growing as the race wore on. i made a key mistake in that the group gave me a gap (which i took), but i failed to commit 100%. my problem was that i was going hard enough to hurt myself but not hard enough to stay away. i did well on positioning, i was strong, and i got the gap--but i needed to either sit up or go all-in quickly. instead i took 10 minutes to make the call. made it over the top of the final climb with the leaders but didn't have it to contest the final sprint. great race, worked really hard. i think if the deck were reshuffled a few times my card might come out on top.
1/3 of our field was time cut. seemed to be the trend.
debated abandoning the crit just because there is SO MUCH great riding around. in the end i made the call to race -- and a commitment to myself to leave more time on either end next year. i was literally salivating (yes, literally!) at the thought of riding baldy.
crit was the most fun i've had in one. loved the course--lots of room for strategy, lots of room for skilled handlers to move around. worked really hard and read the race properly in terms of figuring out where i would need to be before the final sprint, but on the last lap i just didn't have it in my legs. my friend read the race the same way and made the move i couldn't and he was able to take 4th, so i was happy that at least i knew what i needed to do to have a chance for the win.
cali riders are amazing, and i was happy to ride in that field. i think i was ~25th overall. i won't lie: i wanted to win and gave it my best, but it wasn't in the cards. not too shabby for a guy who has been trainer-bound since november. i wanted to get in some race miles ahead of my "A" races, and i came back even more fired up to train harder.
met a lot of great racers, and great people -- people who inspire me and who i hope i will see on the stage race circuit and/or who will come to ride here in the tetons some day!